5 Freakin' years, I thought you died man!
by Riley Baragon
Summary: The same National Treasure we all know and love with an added character. RileyxOC First chapter is more of an opening, it won't follow the movie's actual story plot until the second chapter. Sorry everyone for the crazy delay. Full apology inside.
1. Riley, Riley Poole

_All right, so it took me two years to write five chapters for this story.... that's pretty sad. I'm going to finish this story over the summer, cross my heart! I edited each chapter because I started writing this when I was 15... and I'd like to think I've become a little bit of a better writer since. So if you've already read the first chapters you might as well just skip to the new chapter, but I did change some things.. less quotes and more action! ^_^ Thanks everyone for reading!_

_Oh and I have to put a general disclaimer here. I refer to random books, bands, songs, and probably other things. And I don't own any of them or National Treasure. Thanks for Listening. _

Chapter 1: Riley, Riley Poole

Those walking down Main Street see a 5'5 blonde skipping down the path. She's listening to an ipod way too loud for her own good. It is blasting a song so loud, the people around her can hear it. People can see her mouthing the words if they look close enough. It is pretty easy to see the slight dance in her step as she walks to work. She enters the door and as she walks in she hears, "Jenny!"

It was loud enough to be heard over the music so she turns it off and replies with a similarly loud response of, "Carlie!"

"I missed you lover" says Carlie, with an over-exaggerated flirtatious wink.

"Har-de-har-har", the blonde replies, "sorry I have a boyfriend", she continues, "His name is Mamba bar".

"I told you mamba's come in packs, do we need to start this again?" yells Carlie.

"Ok, Ok, no worries mate" replies Jenny with a cheeky smile and an oddly real sounding Australian accent.

"You know what? Just get to work! I don't know why I try..." Carlie says sadly.

"Aw you know I love you Carlyle the Crocodile!" cheers Jenny with a huge bear hug added for good measure.

"I love you too! Let's never fight again!" responds Carlie goofily.

Both girls head off to their separate offices after the manager yells at them to get to work. Jenny gets in her office and puts her forgotten ipod on the desk. She proceeds to turn on her computer and then sits on her comfortable rolling office chair. She then rolls over to her phone when she sees the blinking number one. "Ooh I have a message" she thinks out loud. She presses play and she hears a voice she hasn't heard in a very long time.

"Hey Jennifer, it's me... Ben. I know it's been a while but I have some very important news! Please call me back at 555-1234."

By then Jenny was fuming. She calls him back immediately and before he even finishes saying hello she screams,"5 freakin' years, I thought you died man!"

"Nope I'm doing fine, but I don't think you are talking to the right person because I have no clue who you are", the man on the other end of the line says.

"Uh... isn't this Ben Gates' number?" asks Jenny, obviously embarrassed.

"Yep I just thought I'd answer it for him... He's in the shower. I'm Riley by the way, Riley Poole. Do you want to leave a message for Ben?"

"Um... no thanks Riley", sighs Jenny.

"He'll probably be done in a few minutes if you want to call back" says Riley, "Mrs...?" Riley adds questioningly.

"Ok I'll do that thanks Riley!" She says. "Bye", he replies to the already dead line.

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"I wonder what that was about", Riley thinks out loud, hanging up the phone.

"What, what was about?" asks Ben.

"Oh just some crazy girl just called me screaming, well called you technically".

"Jenny, already? She's all grown up and waking up early", he says glancing at his watch which reads a slightly blurred 8:03. He rubs his eyes.

"Oh well I told her to call back in a few minutes", Riley says.

"Okey dokey" says Ben.

"okey dokey?" Riley asks, confused at Ben's word choice.

"I think I'm too close to Jenny for my own good" jokes Ben.

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"Okey dokey Bob, on your desk by tonight at 5:00, gotcha." Jenny says into the phone. He continues to talk about the historical importance of the job. When he's done listening to himself talk Jenny says goodbye and leans against her comfy chair. She hurriedly types up the remaining page of the paper. "Six and half wasted pages.", She says to herself, "and who knows how many hours".

"Oh no!", She shrieks, quieting down immediately once she sees the not so friendly glares of her coworkers in hearing distance. "Ben", She grinds out with a menacing, and slightly creepy, smile on her face. She glances at the clock on the wall which reads a depressing 10:10. She dials his number and waits.

The phone rings four times before a slightly breathless "Hello" is heard.

"Hello Ben", She replies in an angry voice. "Do you realize how long it's been? We used to be best friends and then you just decide to... What? move on?!" she continues.

"Breathe Jenny," he chuckles.

"Breathe?" she screams frantically, quickly quieting down to a menacing whisper she adds, "Breathe?, she sighs and asks, "what did you call for Ben?".

"Jenny, the Charlotte." he says and a gasp is heard before she drops the phone.

"Jenny are you there?"

"Yep I'm fine... Ben! Why didn't you say that earlier? Where is she? What is she? What's going on?", says Jenny, getting louder by the second.

"Jen, settle down, I am going to tell you. Ok first of all she's a ship. In the Artic." Ben says.

"The Artic? Awesome! You're gonna find her right?? Ben you have to find her!" she says.

"Of course, I've only been looking for her since I was ten. Now what I called to ask about is whether or not you would like to come for the ride." Ben says teasingly.

"Of course! Where are you? We have the same area code so you came back, huh? We should meet up have some coffee or something?", Jenny says excitedly.

"I don't think you need any coffee Jenny", Ben says smiling, "but sure, do you know where that little bakery called The Cookie Shop is?"

"Yep", Jenny replies quickly.

"Ok then, meet me there in a half an hour, alright?"

"Ok see you soon, Bye!" she says.

"Wait I'm bringing...... ah well guess it'll be a surprise." Ben says while hanging up the phone.

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Jenny walks out the door to her office some 15 minutes after the aforementioned phone call and heads to her bosses office. "Bob!" she screams walking in to his office. No one's there so she drops off the work that was due and quickly exits, thanking her lucky stars he wasn't there and not wanting to risk him coming back. She pulls out her ipod and once again cranks it up to an ungodly volume and starts dancing again... Slightly more obvious this time as proven by the 20 or so people staring at her as she dances across the street. She is now listening to some other random song. Those passerby's listening can hear her singing the song under her breath. By the time she reaches The Cookie Shop she has listened to 5 songs and is now belting out the opening line and dancing slightly crazily, she happens to love this song... or so the people surrounding her assume.

She realizes she is at her meeting place and quickly makes sure her layered black and red tank tops and knee-length white skirt aren't in disarray. She decides she's decent and walks in the door just then realizing that about half of the store was staring at her through the big front window. She turns beet red at the cafe full of people staring at her in silence when Ben stands up and starts clapping. A few other people followed suit while some just laughed. She is now beyond mortified and without a single clue what to do glances around quickly and spots her target... Ben.

People around them can almost see the smoke come out of her ears as she more or less charges. She tries to keep a low profile as the people in the shop finally went back to their own business but she is at a quick-paced walk.

"Ben" she says through gritted teeth when she finally reaches him, "I'm gonna kill you!"

"You know you love me too much to do that", he says while he picks her up in a hug lifting her about 2 inches off the ground "Besides, who would tell you about the Charlotte if I was dead?"

"You lucked out this time buddy", she says smiling slightly. When Ben puts her down she practically tackles him in another hug saying, "I missed you, ya know, is it that hard to call every once in a while?"

Ben chuckles and responds, "I suppose not, but let's get down to business. Oh yeah! Jennifer this is Riley Poole, Riley this is Jennifer Cassidy... Ok now you met."

But he was quickly interrupted by two voices shouting almost simultaneously, "You're that crazy guy/girl from the phone!!"

"So you already know each other?" Ben asks.

Jennifer, at a loss for what to say, not to mention slightly embarrassed from their previous conversation, drops her gaze to the floor... under the table she sees a familiar pair of high top black converse. "Nice shoes", Jenny says smiling slightly.

"Thanks?" he replies then glances down at her shoes and says, "Ah, I like yours too" he says smiling cheesily.

"Ok then", Ben says "now that's done with lets get down to business."

Ben then goes into detail about how everyone is getting there and about the other member of our group. A man named Ian who apparently is the one funding the expedition. Everyone is supposed to meet him the next day to go over the supplies for the trip. Jennifer kind of started daydreaming around there, so she missed the discussion about how they were getting to the artic. All of a sudden, Jennifer sees Riley lift one of his eyebrows up in a confused manner and all of a sudden she feels someone put their hands on her shoulders. Then in an extremely familiar voice, she hears someone whisper:

"We had such a nice night and you never even called me back."

Jennifer tries very hard not to laugh one she realizes who exactly is standing behind her. The looks on both Riley and Ben's faces are priceless but she goes on with their little weird tradition as she turns around the chair looks him straight in the face (he's kneeling), takes both his hands off of her shoulders, and says:

"See, what had happened was.." Jennifer couldn't help but laugh here but quickly calmed down. "I lost your phone number?" She asked, seriously trying to keep a straight face, and failing.

He is a very good actor and the only way Jennifer could tell he was trying not to laugh was the very slight twitch of his frown trying very hard to become a smile. But when she accidentally giggles, he chuckles along with her. Then he stood up and she saw a very small flash of ink at his belt line and asked, "Charles Victor Robin, did you get a tattoo?"

"Maybe", he replied with a cute smirk.

"Charles... don't you lie to me young man." she replies.

"Young man!" he says, acting scandalized, "I'm two years older then you whippersnapper!" he says jokingly.

"Ha ha, please just show me the tat... now!"

"Ok, ok" he says with an evil smirk on his face. He pulls down the left side of his pants and she can tell by the way he's staring at her that he's waiting for an embarrassed reaction but he's going to be waiting for a long time because he's not the only one that can act.

She decides to try and mess with him so she looks at it very closely and yelps, "Oh my gosh, you're cheating on me?"

He looks surprised and she has to cover a smirk as he stutters, "Uh…It's my mom's name".

"No" She responds, turning her back to him. "Your mom's name is Caroline".

"Ok fine you caught me" he says "She's my girlfriend. She's really smart, and funny and nice... here look at this picture". He takes out a picture of a very pretty red head with really pretty green eyes.

"Wow, you're right, she is pretty" Jennifer says "How long have you guys been dating?"

"About three weeks, she's really cool, you should meet her." he says.

"Well I'm kinda busy... Oh my gosh!!" Jennifer turns around quickly and says "Riley, Ben, this is Charles. Charles this is Riley and Ben."

"Nice to meet you Charles", Riley responds, standing up and shaking his hand.

"Nice to meet you too Riley", Charles says with a tone that makes him sound like he's asking a question. Charles glances over at me asking silently, "what's up with this guy?" Jennifer responds with a silent kick in his shin. After about ten seconds of him jumping up and down holding his leg, he responds loudly with, "Oh! So you like him!" Jennifer can't help the red tinge that streaks across her cheeks, making Charles laugh and scoop her up in a side hug. Then, he starts messing up her hair and says, "Awwww, little Jenny-benny's all grown up!" in an impossibly annoying fashion.

"Shut up", she quietly growls.

"It's ok; it's your first crush. It's alright to be embarrassed." Charles says mockingly.

"Any who!" She says loudly, in an obvious attempt to get him to shut up, "We", Jennifer says gesturing to Riley, Ben, and herself, "were having a very important conversation before you so rudely interrupted so if you don't mind..." She trails off.

"I suppose" he sighs dramatically, "Adios mi amiga!"

"Bye", She says, without much enthusiasm.

"Well, that was interesting" states Ben after Charles left.

"Indeed", She responds lamely.

The rest of Ben, Riley, and Jennifer's meeting went by uneventfully. They decided to meet back at Ben's apartment later that evening. Ben asked Jenny if she would like to spend the night since they would have to meet Ian at Ben's apartment at 9:00 the next morning anyway. Both agreed and Ben gave Jennifer his address and told both to meet him there at 6:00 p.m.

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"What to do..." Riley says out loud as he walks down some street, "Wow the sign is actually cut in half. How in the world does that happen?" He says out loud once he see the sign reading "Lin" and has a jagged edge where the rest of the sign should be connected. He spots a Starbucks and decides to head over. With nothing better to do, he decides to sign on his laptop computer to their internet connection. He already ordered a Carmel Macchiato and he takes a sip of it.

He was just getting logged onto the internet when he hears a familiar voice say, "Can I have a White Chocolate Mocha please?"

She must have gone to a different counter than him because a deep male voice, unlike the teenage female voice of his barista, asked, "Tall, Grande, or Venti?"

Riley turns around and hears, "Um... I'll have a Grande please. Oh! And can I have an orange push-up too? They're my favorite".

"Sure", the man answers with a smile in his voice. He leans in close to her and...

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"Oooh a Starbucks!" Jennifer thinks out loud. "I could really go for some coffee right now". She walks up to the counter and sees a very cute red head. Jenny thinks that he may have caught her staring because he smirks when he asks her what she wants. She answers with a slightly embarrassed, "Can I have a White Chocolate Mocha please?" without succeeding in hiding the blush once again spreading across her cheeks.

"Tall, Grande, or Venti?" he continues.

She is slightly distracted by his smirk; _he has very nice lips_, but then realizing she had just been staring at him for about 5 seconds she responds with, "Um... I'll have a Grande please. Oh! And can I have an orange push-up too? They're my favorite".

"Sure" he says. Then he leans down to whisper in her ear, "Orange push-ups have always been my favorite too".

The blush is definitely back but she can't help the laughter that automatically builds up from such an odd phrase. She starts giggling but ends up in almost hysterical laughter. "I'm sorry." She gasps out between bouts of giggles that are still breaking free.

"It's ok", he chuckles.

"They are good aren't they?" She says in a breathless, trying not to laugh, voice. He chuckles again and she glances at his nametag and say, "Nice to meet you Paul, fellow orange push-up fan! I am Jennifer".

She holds out her hand for him to shake when he responds with, "The pleasure is all mine Miss Jennifer.", and a tight squeeze to her hand. He hands her the drink and her push-up, after she pays him the $4.75 in exact change, and walks off trying to find a table. She quickly spots Riley looking at her like she was insane.

She decides to go sit by him. "Hi!" She says to him, trying to be friendly.

"Hey", he says. "What was that about?" he asks pointing a thumb over his shoulder in the general direction of Paul.

"He likes orange push-ups too apparently." She says while opening the treat and licking it.

"Ok then." He says, sounding even more confused then before. Having time to kill, She decides to start up a conversation and asks him all of the cliché 'get-to-know-you' questions. Before long they're laughing and chatting like friends.

_Jennifer and I actually have a lot in common. It turns out we are both computer nerds, we both like similar books, videogames, and we both like to watch movies. She is actually really funny and interesting. She probably has some kind of jock boyfriend though, all the pretty girls do. _Riley sighs. _She and Ben seem pretty close too. Pay attention Riley_, he sees her dimples showing again. "Wanna hear a joke Riley?" she asks. _Wow, I like the way she says my name_.

"Umm s-sure", Riley responds shakily.

"Don't worry it's not a dirty joke, silly", she responds confusing his embarrassment with apprehensiveness. "A man is drowning and along comes a boat to pick him up. 'Here grab onto this' the man on the boat says as he tosses out a round floating device connected to a rope. 'No thanks', the man responds 'God will save me'. The boat leaves and a helicopter comes along and flashes its spotlight on him. 'Don't worry', a man with a bullhorn says, 'We'll help you'. 'No thanks', the drowning man screams over the sound of the propellers, 'God will save me!' The man drowns and when he goes to heaven he asks God, 'Why didn't you save me?' God replies with, 'I sent you a huge boat and a helicopter you idiot!'". She starts giggling like crazy again showing off her perfect teeth and her adorable dimples and Riley chuckles along with her.

Riley glances at his watch and exclaims, "It's already 4:30! We've been here for three and a half hours."

"Wow", she says, "I guess time flies when you are having fun, huh?"

Riley almost blushes at the small remark showing she enjoyed his company. "So, we have to be to Ben's in about an hour and a half..." He says.

"His apartment is about 6 miles away and I need to stop at my apartment for some clothes which is actually only about five blocks from here. It's towards Ben's apartment too so do you wanna come with me?" Jennifer pleads.

It's very hard to ignore the sexual connotations of that statement but Riley actually succeeds in hiding the treacherous blush and responds with a quick, "sure, why not?"

She says, "Yay!" and gathers up both of their garbage and heads over to the trash can by the door. Riley quickly follows her and they are off to her house.

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_How could I ask him to come to my house? I'm such an idiot. He probably thinks I'm some kind of pervert._ "Here we are!" Jennifer says, trying to sound enthusiastic.

"Nice" he replies quietly while looking up at the big building.

"I am on the second floor. Apartment number 4." She says. They both walk up the stairs to her apartment door and she unlocks it and opens the door while saying, "Welcome to my humble abode" with an over dramatic curtsy.

He chuckles and responds with an adorable, "Looks cozy".

He plops down on Jennifer's couch and she says, "I'll be right back, make yourself at home" while glancing at his feet already propped up against her coffee table.

"Way ahead of you" he shouts at her retreating back as he grabs the television remote and starts flipping through the channels. Jennifer goes into her bedroom and quickly closes the door and leans against it with a smile on her face. _He is too cute. _She quickly gets two sets of clothes and changes her current outfit by throwing on an MCR hoodie and putting on some jeans that she had various friends write on.

She walks back out and hears him say, "What's with the change of clothes?"

She blushes slightly because he actually noticed that she changed, and replies with, "Ben is addicted to air conditioning and a rule of thumb: never go to a sleepover in a skirt." He gives her a weird look and says, "Trust me, it's from experience."

He says, "Ok then" and she grabs her huge bag of rice krispie treats out of the cupboard. She had made a pan full the day before.

He gives her a weird looks and asks, "Why in the world do you need a bag full of rice krispie treats?"

"It's a sleepover Riley" She replies in a "duh" voice. "Plus, I don't know when I'll be back and these don't taste as good after a while, you need to eat them quickly." She grabs one out and shoves part of it in her mouth while zip locking the bag closed. "Mmm" She says through a mouthful of marshmallow-y goodness. He gives her a disgusted look and she asks him if he wants one. He politely refuses and she says, "Your loss" with a big smile on her face.

------------

_She's too adorable. _Riley watches as she sticks part of a huge rice krispie treat in her mouth. Jennifer asks him if he wants one but he says that he doesn't because they look like huge bricks.

"Your loss" she responds with a cute smile on her face. "So…" she says "We can either walk to his house or we can take the bus."

"I vote take the bus" Riley says immediately, not wanting to walk all the way there.

"Works for me" she responds. "Ooh if we get the one at 5:30 Sheila might be driving!" she says.

"Ok then" Riley says, slightly confused "Who is Sheila?"

"She's a friend of mine." She responds. They get to the bus stop and she says, "Here hold my hand, if it's Sheila we will get a fee bus ride!"

"O-Ok" Riley stutters as she clasps her small hand in bus pulls up and she walks in and says, "Sheila!" in a falsely surprised voice.

"How are you honey?" the black woman apparently named Sheila responds with a hug.

Jennifer never drops Riley's hand and gives Sheila a one armed-hug. "I'm doing great!" she responds with a gorgeous smile and Riley sees Sheila glance at their clasped hands then at his face and finally back to Jennifer.

She gives a little smirk and says, "I can see that". Sheila apparently realizes the bus is being held up and says, "This ride is on the house honey, go sit down".

Jennifer smiles and says, "Thanks a million Sheila!" and walks to the back of the bus without dropping his hand. When they get to an empty seat she drops his hand and says, "Sorry, but see! We did get a free bus ride".

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_Oh jeez, what if he has a girlfriend and now he thinks I'm hitting on him or something. I mean I didn't want to drop his hand. I can't believe I'm doing this, I just met him. I know Sheila would have given us a free ride anyway even if we weren't holding hands but I just… I don't know. I wanted to hold his hand. _After Jennifer apologizes there is a very awkward silence and she knows Ben would quickly notice it so she decides to break it. She asks Riley about his job and they talk about him not missing his office job on this little trip with Ben.

Riley asks her about how she knew Ben and she just says, "Ben and I used to be best friends. He was almost done with college when I just started high school but we were still very close. His dad always liked me too. His dad always used to say, 'Benjamin, that Jennifer is a very nice girl she's a good influence on you'". Jennifer was laughing after she was done at the poor attempt at reenacting his deep voice. "I was eavesdropping once when I came over to their house."

"Oh" he replies, laughing with her, but apparently at a loss for words. They arrive at their stop and get off the bus. She thanks Sheila once again and makes sure to hold Riley's hand until the bus drives away. _His hand is so warm.. one block that way and we are there. _She looks at the watch on her right hand and realizes that it's only 5:40. "I guess we'll be a little early" She says with a smile.

Jennifer and Riley walk up to Ben's apartment building and right as they are about to open the front door of the building they hear a little girl scream.


	2. Never kiss a cougar

Chapter 2: Never Kiss a Cougar

"What was that?" questioned Riley. "Jennifer, where are you going?" he asks loudly quickly following after her as she runs around Ben's apartment building.

"Help! Someone, help Fred!" Jennifer hears a little girl scream as she runs around Ben's building. She hears Riley calling after her too but she doesn't have time to respond as she runs around the corner and sees… a girl looking up at a tree.

"What's wrong?" She asks, slightly out of breath from the sprint over.

"My cat is in that tree and… and he won't come down!" she sobs.

"Ok, it's going to be alright, I'll get him down for you."

"Really?" she asks though her tears.

"Sure why not" Jennifer mumbles under her breath. She takes off her baggy My Chemical Romance hoodie and tosses it to Riley who is hunched over holding his knees, apparently trying to catch his breath. "Sorry!" She says giggling slightly when it hit him right in the head. She hears him grumble something but then she remembers the task at hand and tries to figure out the easiest way up the tree. There aren't any low branches in the front so she circles it, hoping to see a lower branch on the other side. But of course the lowest branch is one at about the height of her shoulders. "Riley!" She calls out hoping to get a little help.

"What?" he responds moodily.

"Could you give me a boost please?" She asks, using the infamous puppy dog eyes and pout combination.

"Fine", he sighs.

She thanks him repeatedly as he laces his hands together and lowers them down to about where Jennifer's knees are. He quickly boosts her up and she climbs on to the branch so that she's laying on her stomach on top it with a leg on either side.

"You're heavier than you look", he says wiping his hands off on his jeans.

"Thanks", She responds sarcastically. She looks up and sees the next branch is actually really close so she stands up, surprisingly gracefully by her standards, and climbs on to it. She sees the cat is about three branches up and quickly climbs the next two rather easily. The next branch doesn't look very safe so she just reaches up to grab the cat. He quickly runs up her arms and latches his claws around her neck. "Owie", She says quietly as she feels his nails dig into her neck. "It's going to be just fine buddy, no need to choke the life out of me", She reprimands him, while trying to get his nails out from the back of her neck. She gives up and decides to just climb down the tree. She gets down the first two just fine but she can't be expected to climb up and down a tree gracefully, that's just not possible. She slips on the second to last branch and falls on her back on the hard ground. "Ouch", She says miserably.

"Fred!" the little girl screams, as Jennifer sits up with the cat still clinging to her neck. The girl grabs him around the stomach and wrenches him off Jennifer causing his nails to leave three, thin, painful scratch marks on each side of her neck.

"Holy crud!" She exclaims, while laying back onto the ground and flipping over onto her stomach so she can bury her head into the ground. Her hands are clutching each side of her neck. She hears the little girl run off and footsteps, that are undoubtedly Riley's, running towards her.

"Are you alright?" he asks cautiously.

"Peachy keen", Jennifer responds while rolling over. She sits up and takes her hands off of the sides of her neck. There are quite a few droplets of blood dripping down her hands and flowing down her wrists. She feels nauseous at the sight for a second, watching the streams of red travel down her pale skin. She comes back to reality when she feels Riley push her hair out of the way so he can get a better look at her neck. She hears him let out a low whistle.

"Ouch", he whispers. He grabs her hand to help her up and she stumbles a bit. Her head is still spinning a bit from her graceful fall from the tree not even three minutes ago. He catches her and her head ends up resting on his shoulder while she places a stabilizing hand against his quickly backs up once she realizes the position they were in.

"Sorry", She mumbles as she starts walking back to the front of Ben's apartment building.

"Jenny", he calls out.

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_She's actually climbing the tree. Wow. _

"Do you think Fred will be alright?" Riley hears the little girl ask worriedly while she stared straight up at the tree trying to see any sign of Jenny or her cat.

"I'm sure he'll be fine", Riley responds, "Its Jenny I'm worried about" He continues under his breath. She didn't seem to hear him seeing as her gaze never left the tree. It seemed like an hour later when he sees Jennifer fall from the tree and land on her back. The little girl immediately runs over but he can't seem to move. _Is she alright? What if she got seriously injured because I didn't go up to try and get the cat instead of her?_ She sits up so Riley knows she's alright but then he hears her scream "Holy crud!" and watches her fall back onto the ground. The little girl runs off with her cat in hand and Riley quickly heads over trying to see if she's alright. When he reaches her he sees that she's grasping her neck. "Are you alright?" he asks.

"Peachy keen", she responds sarcastically. He can't help but smile slightly. _She's still sarcastic. _She takes her hands from her neck and Riley sees her staring at the blood running down her hands. _Why is she bleeding? _He moves the hair from around her neck and lets out a low whistle at the sight. _Dang, the cat got her good. _

"Ouch", He whispers sympathetically. He stands up from his kneeling position and offers her a hand up. She takes it and as she is getting up she stumbles slightly. Riley holds her up, ending with both of them in a slightly awkward situation. He has one of his hands on her lower back while her head is resting against his shoulder with one of her hands placed against his chest. She quickly backs away and without ever looking up at him, she starts walking back around the front of the apartment building. "Jenny", he calls out without thinking. She turns around and Riley gets caught up in the moment for a second. Her hair glides gently around her shoulders as she spins to face. Her face is flushed, most likely from the fall, and she looks… gorgeous.

"What?" she asks and Riley comes out of my little fantasy.

"Uh…Here's your sweater!" He responds quickly. _Nice save_.

"Oh", she responds sounding disappointed. _Why would she be disappointed though? I must just be hearing things. _She takes the sweater from him and both of them head around to the front of Ben's apartment.

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_Well I have ten more minutes before they should be here. What should I do?_ Ben figures. Immediately after his thoughts there's a loud knock at the door and he walks over to answer it. Jennifer and Riley are both standing there when he gets there but he can immediately tell something is wrong. There is blood all over Jennifer's hands. "Jennifer, what did you do now?" He asks jokingly. He was sincerely worried though as he grabbed her wrist gently and led her into the living room, while motioning for her to sit on the couch.

"It's Riley's fault", she said in a whiny, child's voice. "See, what had happened was, Riley and I met up at Starbucks on accident and decided to head to the zoo. When we were there he triple dog dared me to kiss a cougar and me, being the ever daring person that I am, could not back down from such a serious challenge. I jumped right in there and kissed the thing right on the mouth. He liked it a little too much apparently, because he tackled me to the ground while wrapping his huge paws around my neck leaving these huge scratch marks." She finished, while brushing the hair from around her face showing three, thin marks on either side of her neck still steadily bleeding. Ben quickly retrieves the first aid kit he had in his cabinet once he saw the scratches.

"Very funny", Ben replies to her crazy story. "Now what actually happened?" He asks turning to Riley for a straight answer.

"She climbed up a tree to save some girls cat and on the way down it must have clawed her neck." He answered Ben, while walking out of the living room.

"That was very brave of you Jennifer", Ben says in a joking, fatherly manner, while he cleans the scratches. She giggles at his joke and he tells her, "well, they won't be bleeding anymore but I don't have any band-aids big enough for these scratches. Unless you want me to wrap them in gauze…"

"No!" she responds quickly, "If they stopped bleeding I'll be fine."

"Are you all right otherwise?" Ben asks.

"Actually my back is killing me", she complains burying her face in a throw pillow at the end of his couch.

"Did the 'cougar' scratch you there too?" Ben asks, complete with air quotes.

"Actually she fell from the tree", Riley adds in, chuckling slightly.

"Are you sure you're alright?" Ben asks, more worried now.

"Yeah, I'm good" she says, "Just a bruise."

"If you're sure", Ben says, still slightly unsure.

"Can I take a shower?" Jenny asks randomly, about an hour later while all three are gathered around the table talking about the Charlotte.

"Sure", Ben says. "It's the last door at the end of the hall and the towels are in the closet next to the sink".

"Thanks" she says with a quick smile as she grabs some clothes out of her duffle bag and heads to the shower. Riley and Ben continue our conversation until they hear Jennifer quietly singing in the shower.

----------------

_Wow, Ben uses lavender and chamomile shampoo. _"It does smell pretty good though", Jennifer says to herself. She finishes putting the conditioner in her hair but she wants to leave it in for a bit so she starts singing the first tune that pops into her head. She tries to stay quiet so the guys don't hear her and she walks back into the kitchen all clean and shiny in her flannel pajama bottoms and Harry Potter t-shirt.

"Hello everyone", She says cheerfully, brushing out her hair with her fingers. She heads over to her duffel bag and shuffles through it until she finds her brush. She walks back over and stands behind her seat continuing to brush her hair, when she realizes they were both staring at her. "Yes", she says questioningly.

"Nothing", Riley says quickly. "We were just talking about what we would spend our shares of the treasure on. What would you buy?"

"This treasure is about more than the money! This is for historical use. We aren't going to keep it. We are going to give the items to museums for everyone to see." Ben interrupted.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. Anyways, what would you buy Jen?" Riley cut in.

"What I really want to do is travel the world! I want to go to Japan, Ireland, England, China, everywhere!" She responds dreamily. "I would probably take Nick with me so I'd have to wait a year or two."

"Is Nick your boyfriend?" Riley asks.

"Nope he's my little brother." She says smiling slightly, "Actually, he's not that little, he's going to be seventeen soon."

"Have you seen him lately?" Ben asked.

"Nah, mom still thinks I'm a bad influence on him so I haven't even been able to talk to him since last June." She responds sadly. "I can't believe it's been so long." She whispers to no one in particular. Ben quickly stands up and pulls her into a hug.

"She doesn't know what she's talking about Jennifer, at least when he turns eighteen you'll be able to talk to him all you want right?" he says trying to put a positive spin on things for her.

"Yep", She says, acting happy again so that he wouldn't worry. They continue to talk about "happy things" until Ben notices Jennifer yawn.

"Jennifer, if you're getting tired you can take my bed, I'll sleep on the couch" Ben offers graciously.

"No way Ben", She shakes her head and stifles another yawn, "You are letting me stay in your apartment, I am not taking your bed too. Plus, I like your couch, it's really comfy." She says smiling.

"Fine", he sighs, "I'll get you some blankets and another pillow."

"Thanks Ben" She yawns, settling down on he couch. "Where are you sleeping Riley?"

"I'm sleeping on the couch over there", he says, pointing to a couch on the other side of the living room.

"Wow, I didn't even notice there was another couch over there." She lets out another yawn. She could hear Riley chuckle at her foolishness when Ben walks back out. "You actually still have this purple quilt Ben?" She asks excitedly while she grabs it and snuggles into it.

"Of course I kept your quilt Jenny!" he says acting scandalized, "How could you even ask that? I said I would treasure it forever and I will".

"Thanks Ben", She responds, truly meaning it.

"Goodnight Jenny", he says, before tucking her in and kissing her on the forehead. He gives Riley a blanket and a pillow before starting to walk back to his room.

"Aren't you going to tuck Riley in?" She asks sleepily.

Riley and Ben both look at each other then back at her and say in perfect unison, "No".

"Okay then", She giggles. "Goodnight Ben. Goodnight Riley".

"Goodnight Jennifer", they both say exasperatedly at the same time.

---------------

Riley always hated the fact that she was a very light sleeper. He woke up at the quietest sounds. Well that all changed tonight. He heard Jennifer moving on the couch and he thought she was just rolling over. _Is she crying?_ Riley quickly sits up and looks over at her. She was sitting up and he could easily see her shoulders shaking. "Woah, what happened? What's wrong?" Riley asked as he tried to get off the couch. He ended up sprawled across the floor because the blankets were wrapped around his ankles. Riley saw her glance over at him and she started giggling at his clumsiness. He grabbed his glasses off the end table and he got up. "Very nice, laugh at the one who wants to help you", Riley says sarcastically.

"Sorry", she says with her head down.

"It's fine", He says quickly "I was just kidding." He walked over by the side of her couch and asked her, "What's wrong?" She just shook her head.

------------

She couldn't cry in front of him. _It was just a silly nightmare. I shouldn't let it get to me._ He put his hand on the side of her face that was turned away from him and he gently turned her to face him.

"What's wrong?" he asked her kindly.

"Nothing", She says quietly, trying to keep tears from streaming down her face. A single tear fights it's way slowly down her cheek. He was still holding her face so that she was facing him and he gently wiped the tear away with his thumb. She closed her eyes to try and block out any more tears from coming.

"You can talk to me", he says quietly taking his hand off of her face, seemingly taking the heat away from her whole body. She quickly clutches the blanket tighter around her and when she opens up her eyes, she sees that he looked sympathetic and really serious, instead of the normal sarcastic, and joking Riley she saw since she had met him.

She let out a breath she didn't know she had been holding and said quietly, "It was just a silly nightmare", once again looking down into her lap.

"If it made you cry it isn't silly", he said quietly. She looks up into his eyes but quickly glances away when she realizes she was blushing. Luckily it's dark so she's pretty sure he didn't see it.

"It was about my brother", which was partially true because her brother was in there but that wasn't what made her cry. He quickly leaned over and hugged her. She was so surprised at the embrace that her eyes opened up very wide and her mouth dropped open. She realized what was happening and quickly wrapped her arms around his neck since she was a little bit above him. She was on the couch and he was on the floor after all, and buried her head in between his arm and his shoulder. He started drawing small circles on her back and whispering things to cheer her up in her ear but she wasn't really paying attention. She was blown away by the fact that Riley could care so much about someone he just met, especially when that person was her. She mumbled a thanks into his shoulder and she felt him hug her a little tighter as a "your welcome". A couple of seconds later he gets up from his kneeling position on the floor and heads back to his couch.

"Ah, my leg is asleep", She hears him mumble under his breath. He starts limping away and she has to hold back her laughter from the silly sight. He starts jumping up and down on one foot to try and wake it up and she turns away so that her face is buried in the couch to try and prevent him from hearing her laugh.

-----------------------

_Ouch. Stupid kneeling, blocking my stupid blood, from getting to my stupid leg. _Riley was about to climb back onto the couch when he sees Jennifer's shoulders shaking again. He rushes over and starts rubbing her back again and asking her if she's ok. She rolls over and he realizes that she was laughing at him. "Oh it's on" He whispers menacingly with a smirk on his face. He starts tickling her and she's laughing so hard tears are steaming down her face. She's trying to push his hands away so he sits on top of her to prevent her from getting away.

"Uncle! You win, I give up! Just stop please! I can't breathe" she says breathlessly between laughs.

"That's what I thought" He said, rolling off of her and standing beside the couch. He turns and starts walking back to his couch in hopes that she won't see him blushing.

"Goodnight Riley" she says adorably, wrapped up in her quilt and trying to stifle a yawn.

"Goodnight Jennifer."

-----------------------

_I can't believe I slept until eight-thirty!_ Ben quickly wakes Riley up and heads over to wake Jenny up when Riley stops him.

"Wait, she didn't sleep well last night. Let her sleep a little longer." he yawns out.

"What happened?"

"She had a nightmare", he answered while stretching. Ben says 'all right' but then tells him to make sure to wake her up in fifteen minutes because Ian's coming at nine. Ben he hears him mumble in the affirmative and quickly heads off to take a shower. By the time he takes a shower, gets dressed, and shaves, it's already ten to and he hears a knock at the door.

He quickly jogs to the door to answer it and says a quick greeting to Ian and invites him in. He walks in the living room with Ben and he realizes Riley's mistake.

Riley walks into the living room with a bowl of cereal and says, "Morning" with a nod of his head.

Ian sits beside Riley on the couch and then points to Jennifer and asks, "Who is the young lady on the couch, Ben?"

"That would be Jennifer", Ben responds, sighing as he stoops down to try and wake her up. "Time to wake up Jen", He whispers in her ear while gently rubbing her shoulder.

"Five more minutes" she groans, rolling over and burying her face in the couch.

Ben pokes her back to try and get her up and she makes an odd yelping sound before jumping right off of the couch and falling, on her back, and onto the floor.

"Owie", she moans. "My back really hurts", she says rolling onto her stomach. Her shirt is bunched up and Ben can see her lower back, where there is a pretty nasty bruise from yesterday.

"Sorry Jen, I forgot about yesterday."

"It's alright", she says rolling back over and quickly sitting up. "Holy cow! Who are you?" she asks obviously referring to Ian, while pulling down her bunched up shirt.

"I'm Ian Howe", he responds smoothly, while getting up and reaching a hand out to her. He pulls her up and kisses the back of her hand. By that time she's blushing furiously. Her hair is put up and Ben sees him glance at the scratches around her neck. "What happened?" he asked her quietly as he took his finger and gently traced one of the scratches around her neck.

"Oh…uh I kind of got attacked by a cat", she says quietly, immediately reaching a hand up and rubbing her neck. "I'm going to go get dressed now", she says quickly while grabbing her duffle bag and heading towards the bathroom. Riley was sending death glares at Ian while eating his cereal the whole time.

"Riley, how could you forget to wake her up?" Ben asked angrily. He knew she was completely embarrassed by now.

"I was getting cereal", he said motioning to his bowl, "and I forgot."

Ben sighed and quickly sits on the couch she was just sleeping on. Ian follows suit and they start talking about plans for the trip to the Arctic.

-----------------

_I can't believe that just happened! First I fall off of the couch in front of the guy; I was sleeping when he came in. Then, he kisses my hand and touches my neck and… dang he has soft hands, and a cute accent. My gosh, I think my face is going to be cherry-colored for the rest of my life! Look at my hair! Holy cow, I can't believe I'm going to be going on this adventure with this guy. I've never been more embarrassed. _Jennifer quickly brushed through her hair, throw on a half-sleeved, light blue shirt with flared sleeves and a flared pair of dark-blue jeans.

She looks up and sees that she's still blushing. _Cold water, I need cold water. _She quickly splashes some cold water on her face and she eventually turns back to her normal, pale self. "Alright, here we go", She says to herself quietly. She steps out of the bathroom, leaving her duffel bag next to the door.

---------------

The group end up talking about the trip for about three hours, finally deciding on leaving in a week to fly first, then take vehicles already rented by Ian, to the where Riley has discovered to be the approximate area of the Charlotte. They go their separate ways, deciding to meet up at Ben's apartment on the following Friday at six in the morning (much to Jennifer's dismay).

The week went by quickly, and before Jennifer even realized it, it was Thursday afternoon. She had already gotten the time off and finished the extra work her boss gave her to make sure he did all of her work before she left. All she has to do now is pack and wake up at five in the morning. _Great. _Jennifer quickly went home and packed after work, grabbing her favorite jeans, two t-shirts, and some underwear. She decides to head off to bed early and sets her alarm clock for five o'clock.

She wakes to an annoyingly loud buzzing in her ear. "Ok, ok I'm up", She says groggily to no one. She gets out of bed, brushes her teeth, takes a quick shower and gets dressed into a pair of pinstripe black pants, a green day shirt and long, black fingerless gloves that go a little above her elbows. Of course she is wearing her favorite black converse as well. She looks at the clock and sees that it's 5:40. She grabs a granola bar and a go-gurt and heads out the door. "Yummy", She says under her breath, on her way to Ben's home. She quickly jogs to catch up to the bus when she notices that it's already at the stop.

It takes her about a block away from Ben's apartment and she looks at her watch and realizes that it's 5:55. "Oh yeah, I'm so on time!" She says excitedly. She gets to Ben's apartment and decides to peek around the back. "No cat's stuck in trees? Good." She says to no one. Jennifer is actually the first to make it to his apartment.

Jennifer sits on the couch with her empty go-gurt tube and her half eaten granola bar. She quickly gets up and throws out the empty go-gurt and then takes the granola bar out of its wrapper and throws it out too. She sticks the rest of the granola bar into her mouth when she hears a knock at the door.

Ben shouts out, "Jennifer, can you get the door for me?"

She wanted to say no, to explain the problem, but her mouth was full so she just walked over to the door and opened it. She was still chewing a huge mouthful of S'mores granola bar when she sees Ian with three other guys behind him. She opens the door so they can get in but when he gives her a confused look, she puts up her pointer finger telling him to give her a second, and points to her mouth showing that she was eating. He nods, smiling at her and she has to cover another blush. She closes the door behind him and his friends as Riley comes out and starts talking to them.

She quickly swallows her granola bar and walk over to one of Ian's friends. "Hi, I'm Jennifer" She says with a smile, holding out her hand for him to shake. He tells her that his name is Shaw and introduces her to both Shippen and Powell, the other two men that came along. Ben finally walks out and they all head to the van behind his house. Everyone climbs in and she's stuck in the back next to Riley with Shippen, Shaw, and Powell across from them.

They finally get to the mini airport; they are taking a small, private plane to an area just south of where Riley has estimated the Charlotte's location. Ian distributed the huge jackets, boots, hats, and gloves on the trip and she tries to put her's on. The jacket is a little big on her and goes down to right above her knees. The sleeves end right where her fingers start too. _At least I'll be warm_. They end up in these awesome, huge snow vehicle things. _What are these called anyway?_

"I was thinking about Hanson and Perry, crossing this kind of terrain with nothing more then dog sleds and on foot. Can you imagine?" Ben says to Riley, Ian, and Jennifer.

Ian replies instantly with, "It's extraordinary."

"Awesome", She says in wonder. "Are we getting closer Riley?"

"Assuming Ben's theory is correct and my tracking model's accurate, we should be getting very close. But don't go by me, I broke a shoelace this morning." Riley says. After getting some incredulous looks from Ben, Ian, and Jennifer, he explains, "It's... it's a bad omen."

"Should we turn around and go home?" Ian asks falsely serious.

"Or we could pull him over and just throw him out here." Ben says jokingly.

Jennifer laughs along with everyone else but end up saying, "Of course we wouldn't throw you out Riley!" and give him a quick hug. "Hey Riley", Jennifer adds.

"Yes?" he asks.

"Can we trade hats?"

"Why?"

"Because yours is adorable and has little flaps for the ears. Do you want my ears to be all cold?"

"I don't want my ears to be cold. I don't really care about your ears." Riley responds quickly.

"You don't care?" She asks pouting, with fake tears coming to her eyes. "I thought we was cool!"

"Quoting Unreal Championship Two characters won't help you."

"Not even Malcolm? The coolest of all characters." Jennifer asks, the fake tears immediately disappearing.

"Not even Malcolm", he deadpans. "He isn't the best though, I like Selket more."

"You only like her because she has big boobs and flashes people."

"She's a good fighter too. That's just a plus" Riley says smiling.

"Fine! I don't want your stupid hat anyway!" She says, crossing her arms and looking out the window.


	3. A cute man from Hitler Land

Chapter 3: A Cute Man From Hitler Land

The beeping of the computer woke Jennifer from her reverie. They stopped and everyone got out, taking a metal detector with them to search for the ship buried somewhere in the ice. Riley, Shippen and Jennifer all walked in the same direction, sweeping their metal detectors from side to side in an effort to find the ship.

"Look... this is a waste of time. How could a ship wind up way out here?" Shippen asks Riley.

"Well, I'm no expert, but... it could be that the hydrothermic properties of this region produce hurricane-force ice storms that cause the ocean to freeze and then melt and then refreeze, resulting in a semisolid migrating land mass that would land a ship right around here." Riley answers causing Jennifer to laugh. Minutes later Ben's metal detector starts going off causing Jennifer to run up to him.

"Ben! You found it!" she exclaims excitedly.

"Hello, beautiful." Ben whispers once he wipes the snow off of the cannon with the ship's name on it. Eventually the ship is dug up using the machines they rode in, no thanks to Jennifer who made twelve snow angels and two snowmen while everyone else worked. "Okay, let's go!" Ben shouts.

Riley hands Jennifer a flashlight and she mutters a thanks before everyone descends into the ship. After only two steps Jennifer slips and falls right onto Ian. After apologizing profusely, and him just laughing it off, they start off again. Not even a minute later she hears Riley freaking out on the other side of the room so she hurries over.

"You handled that well." Ben says dully. Everyone makes it into the ships' cargo hold and Riley suggests looking in the barrels. She eventually pries one open and inside is gunpowder. Ben wanders to the other side of the room and we follow. He searches through a barrel and finds a package. He unwraps it to reveal a polished, wooden black box with strange symbols on it. The symbols look almost Egyptian, the center is a bird, and on either side of it are people. Inside of it lays a ivory white pipe.

Ben, of course, immediately recognizes it as a Miashawn pipe, and Riley jokes about how much it might be worth. Jennifer is trying to see it in between all of the guys. She eventually pushes Riley out of the way to get a better look.

"It's a clue." Ben says dramatically, motioning for Ian to hand it back. He slices his thumb open, causing Riley and her to both visibly flinch, and spreads his blood over the stem of the pipe and scrolls the stem over a piece of paper printing the next clue with Templar symbols. The bloody clue reads:"The legend writ,The stain affected,The key in Silence -five in iron pen,Mr. Matlack can't offend."

"Yay, another riddle." Jennifer said sarcastically.

"Sh, I need to think." Ben says, before going off on some tangent about legends and keys both being on maps. The key in silence means that the map must be invisible, according to Ben. "The stain affected must refer to the dye or agent used to bring about some result making what was previously undetectable detectable. But what does Iron pen mean"

"Prison." Shippen states, somewhat randomly.

"Albuquerque. See I can do it too. Snorkel." Riley jokes.

"Wait!" Jennifer shouts. "Mr. Matlack was the scribe of the Declaration of Independence. Wait, that can't mean."

"Come on. There can't be an invisible map on the back of the Declaration of Independence." Riley states, quickly figuring out what she was proposes that they "borrow" the Declaration of Independence. Ben turns him down immediately of course, it's the Declaration of Independence after all!

Shaw immediately pulls out a gun and points it at Ben when he disagrees. Ben tells Ian that there is more to the riddle, so they can't shoot him. Shaw points the gun at Jennifer. "Tell me what I need to know or I will shoot your friend." Ian threatens.

"Hey, that's not necessary." Jennifer says, holding her hands up.

"What's more important to you Ben?" Ian asks smugly.

Riley, meanwhile, is right behind Jennifer freaking out. "Who brings a gun on an Artic adventure? Honestly." Jennifer can't help laugh, before she remembers the gun pointed at her. Shaw pulls down the hammer on the back of the gun.

"What do I need to know Ben?"

Ben grabs a flare and lights it up against a barrel. He threatens to drop it, burning the place up because of all the gunpowder.

"What you need to know, is if Shaw can catch." Ben throws it, Ian grabs for it but because of the gunpowder on his glove from earlier, his glove bursts into flame and causes him to drop it.

Ian and his lackeys run out of the only exit, and lock the door behind them.

"Oh my gosh, oh my gosh." Jennifer says, pacing. Riley grabs her arm and drags her over to Ben.

"What are we gonna do Ben?" He asks, freaking out. Luckily enough, Ben found something called a smugglers hold and dragged us into it with him. They barely make it far enough away before the fire reaches the barrels, causing a huge explosion. They all end up covered in snow and soot. Panting for breath, Jennifer tries and sits up, but a sharp pain shoots through her hand. When she pulls off her glove, she sees a huge cut bleeding pretty badly going from the middle of the back of her hand down, a little past her wrist. She tries to quickly cover it up so that Riley and Ben don't worry but it's too late.

"What happened?" Riley asks, grabbing her hand and pulling the glove back off.

"Oh, I'm not sure." She says, faking thoughtfulness. "Maybe it's because of the ship that just exploded around us."

"It's pretty deep." Ben says, turning her hand to the side and making her wince in pain. "There's an Inuit village about nine miles east of here. We'll get you some help when we get there." Ben says, pulling the glove back over her hand.

"Wow, it cut right through." Riley states, looking at the hole in her glove.

"Keep pressure on it." Ben says, handing Jennifer a handkerchief. She pushes it against her arm, biting back a cry of pain. They start the journey back; Riley and Ben start talking about stuff.

"So, what's your story?" Riley asks after an hour of walking.

"What do you mean?"

"How did you get into this business?" Riley asks, clearing up her confusion.

"Ah, nothing out of the ordinary really. I always loved History, probably because Ben brainwashed me when we were little." Jennifer said, sticking her tongue out playfully at Ben. "We're bestest friends." She adds cheerily. Riley goes back to talking to Ben about something or other when a wave of nausea hits her. She glances down at her hand and realizes it was bleeding out of the handkerchief and she didn't even notice. A small trail of blood was left behind them, next to their footsteps.

"So how long have you guys known each other anyway?" Riley asks randomly. She is still trying to cover up her hand, putting more pressure on it to try and stop the bleeding.

"Since I was seven." Jennifer answered, a huge headache coming on.

"Wait, so why did you guys stop talking"

"We moved when I was seventeen, and we called each other once in a while but then I went to college and I didn't have much time. We just kind of went our separate ways." Ben announces they're almost there so she tries to push herself a little further. It seems her body is at it's limit though because her vision goes black, and she sinks into darkness.

-----------

"Jenny, Jenny, wake up." a deep voice says, giving her a gentle nudge in the shoulder.

"Huh?" She yawns, sleepily. "Where are we?"

"We made it to the village." Riley answers. "They patched up your hand and now we're on a plane back home."

"Oh, cool." She yawns. She rolls over and snuggles back into what she thought was her pillow. It turns out to be Riley's lap.

"Wake me up when we get there." She sighs. She wakes up to the feeling of someone's hand running through her hair. She moans sleepily. "Wakey-wakey Jen." Riley says cutely. She opens her eyes and realizes how close his face is to hers and how easy it would be to lean up and kiss him. _What am I thinking?_ She shakes her head, a blush spreading across her cheeks. "I'm awake." She says, backing up slightly.

-------------------------

_She looks so adorable lying there, snuggled into my lap_. That thought makes Riley chuckle. "Ah, my leg's asleep." He whines. Leaning over, he runs his hand through Jennifer's soft hair. He leans over and presses a soft kiss on her forehead before he realizes what he's doing. _Why did I do that? _She moans in her sleep and Riley says, "wakey-wakey Jen." She opens her eyes and Riley realizes he's still leaning over her, she starts shaking her head and backs up.

"I'm awake"

"What were you dreaming about anyway?" Riley asks, her blue eyes locking with his.

"Nothing much, why do you ask?" She nervously asks.

"You were kind of mumbling in your sleep." He smirks slightly at her when she blushes in embarrassment and asks Riley what he heard. The only thing she said clearly was the name Derek so he tells her that.

"Yeah he was my best friend in college." she explains.

"Was?"

"Yeah, he passed away a couple years back." she says, becoming oddly interested in her hands. She looked sad so Riley reached over and grasped her hand in his. She quickly glanced up at him and Riley started playing with her fingers making her smile. "Thumb war." she challenges. "1, 2, 3, 4; I declare a thumb war. 5, 6, 7, 8; hope you can keep your thumb straight." She immediately attacks his thumb with hers, trying to push it over, but Riley's hand was quite a bit larger than hers so his thumb was longer. She was biting her lip in concentration, and he wasn't really paying attention until she started cheating.

"I had no choice, you weren't even moving your thumb!" she answers to Riley's amused accusation. He couldn't help but chuckle. A little while later she receives a call on her cell phone and he can't help but listen in on her conversation.

"Hey Charles, you'd never guess where I was." After a couple second pause, she responds, "Nope I'm in a plane, above." she pauses, glancing out the window, "somewhere." She starts giggling, making Riley smile.

"Silly. I'm probably not going to be able to see you for a while yet." she says playing with her hair. She sighs dramatically before saying, "I know. Life without me must be terrible. I miss you too." she smiles sweetly, laughing loudly. "I love you too. Adios, me amigo." she finishes. "Yeah, well it's not very easy getting a signal in the Artic. Yeah, I promise to call you next time I go to some obscure continent." she says, pausing to listen to him between each phrase. "Right." she says, stretching out the word. "I'll call you later. Say hi to Claire for me. Bye!"

"Charles is my friend" she says, smiling over at RIley.

"I didn't ask." He responds quickly.

"I know, but you wanted to know." she smiled.

"We're here." Ben says, saving Riley from having to respond.

The return to Ben's house was relatively simple. Jennifer's hand didn't even need stitches and they quickly returned to their mission.

Unfortunately, they weren't having much luck in this leg of the race. They had called and had meetings with four different establishments in an effort to protect the Declaration from Ian. But no one would believe they're warnings.

Riley, Ben, and Jennifer were just walking out of the J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building, all of them bummed out. They had been all over the city trying to find someone who could help them with their problem and this was Ben's last idea.

"Is it really so hard to believe that someone is going to steal the Declaration of Independence?" Riley asks, frustrated.

"They get ten thousand tips a week, they're not going to worry about something they know is safe." Ben answers glumly.

"Anyone that can help us will think we're crazy and anyone crazy enough to believe us isn't going to want to help." Riley says.

"We don't need someone crazy, but one step short of crazy and what do you get?" asks Ben. "Obsessed." laughs Riley.

"I have to go with Riley on this one." Jennifer answers when Ben looks to her for help.

"Passionate." Ben corrects us.

"Hey you guys, I have an idea!" Jennifer shouts, excited at her epiphany.

"What now?" Riley asked, sounding tired.

"I have connections in the National Archives. I know someone very passionate, borderline obsessed in my opinion." Jennifer smiles.

They headed there, Jennifer skipping excitedly at the thought of seeing an old friend. They eventually got in. "Dr. Chase can see you now Mr. Brown." the receptionist calls. After receiving odd looks from Riley and Jennifer, he explains that his name isn't exactly respected in the academic community."Being kept down by the man." Riley jokes. "A very cute man." he finishes, causing a twinge of jealousy to sting Jennifer unexpectedly.

"Abby!" Jenny shouts, pointing her right hand up in the air, reminiscent of a Hitler greeting.

"Jennifer, how many times do I have to tell you to stop that?" she asks in a voice meant for reprimanding a toddler. "I was on the phone."

"One more I guess." Jennifer says, lazily putting her feet up on the lady's desk. "What can I say, it's the cult of personality." Abby comes around the desk and pushes Jennifer's feet off of it.

"Don't touch those!" Abby reprimands Ben for touching her George Washington campaign buttons.

"Sorry. Your missing the 1789 inaugural though, I found one once"

"How very fortunate for you"

"Your accent... Pennsylvania Dutch"

"No, Saxony German"

"Your not American?" Riley asks rudely causing Jennifer to smile and reply,"Hitler land!"

"Jennifer I swear to gosh!" She yells back, quickly quieting down.

"Oh no not to gosh!" Jennifer responds smiling.

"Anyways what are you here for gentleman?" she asks, turning her back to Jennifer.

"Someone's going to steal the Declaration of Independence." Ben states.

"It's true." Riley confirms after a moment of silence.

"I think I better put you gentleman in touch with the FBI." She responds after another pause.

"We've been to the FBI and they assured us that the Declaration could not possibly be stolen." Riley responds. She agrees with the FBI's statement and Ben goes on to explain that he wants to look at the back of the document himself to make sure it was in no danger. He tells her, in a few words, that there is an invisible treasure map on the back of the Declaration of Independence. He came to that conclusion from the fact that there was an engraving on a two hundred year old pipe owned by Free Masons. When he couldn't show it to her she mockingly asks, "What, did Big foot take it?" making Ben a little mad.

"Come on Abby, it's not that unbelievable." Jennifer whines.

"Jenny, are you on drugs?"

"Abby, come on. You know me! Why would I lie about something like this?"

"The joke has gone on long enough Jennifer, get out of my office"

"But Abby, I…"

"Out!" she yells at Jennifer, before turning to the guys. "It was nice meeting you"

"You know, that really is a nice collection. Must have taken you a long time to hunt down all that history." Ben said, before walking out the door.

"Sorry guys, I thought she would understand." Jennifer sighs dejectedly as they walk out of the office and into the display room of the National Archives building.

"Ben, if it's any consolation you had me convinced." Riley says helpfully, and Jennifer agrees with him.

"It's not" Ben says. "180 years of searching and I am 3 feet away. Of all the ideas that became the United States, there is a line here that is at the heart of all the others." Ben starts quoting the Declaration of Independence "But when a long train of abuses and years of patience perusing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism"

"It is their right, it is their duty to throw off such government and provide new guards for their future security." Jennifer cuts him off.

"You have it memorized too, huh?" Ben sends a smile to Jennifer and she shrugs. He turns back to the case. "I'm going to steal it"

"What?" Riley and Jennifer ask in unison.

"I'm going to steal the declaration of independence." Ben says resolutely before calmly walking away from them.

"Uh... Ben?!" Riley chases Ben and Jennifer follow after. "This is huge. Prison huge. You are going to go to prison. You know that?" Riley asks, sitting on the steps of the National Archives Building.

Jennifer shows up and sits next to him when Ben says "Yeah probably"

"That would bother most people." Riley responds.

"Ian's going to try and steal it and if he succeeds, he will destroy the declaration. The fact is the only way to protect the declaration is to steal it. It's upside-down. I don't think there's a choice." Ben says, sitting down next to me on the steps.

"Ben, for god-sakes it's like stealing a national monument. It's like stealing him. It can't be done. Not that it shouldn't be done, it can't be done. Let me prove it to you." Riley says, standing up anxiously. Riley leads us to the Library of Congress and while there, Jennifer get, a phone call.

"I'll be in, in a minute guys." Jennifer says, while answering her cell phone. It's Abigail! "What do you want?" Jennifer asks dully.

"I'm sorry Jennifer, but come on! An invisible map on the back of the Declaration of Independence? It's nonsense."

"Abby, if you called to yell at me again then you wasted your time"

"No, I wanted to apologize and invite you to a party."

"A party?"

"Yeah, there's a Gala this weekend at the National Archives and I have an extra ticket." She says excitedly.

"You just want an excuse to go shopping." Jennifer laughed.

"Please, Jenny all the people are so... stuffy"

"Stuffy?" Jennifer giggles.

"You know what I mean. Now come on, we can go shopping tomorrow. I know the perfect place." She says.

"Ok, sounds good." Jennifer quickly comes up with a plan that might help Ben. They agree to meet at three the next day to go shopping. When Jennifer walks into the building she sees Riley grabbing books and she heads over to Ben to tell him her idea. "Ben! There's a gala at the National Archives next week, we can try and steal it then!" She says excitedly.

He holds up a gala pamphlet. "I had the same idea." he said, smiling. "Wait, how did you find out about it?" he asks her.

"Abigail just asked me to go with her." She responds while sitting down next to Ben.

Riley returns with arms full of papers and books. "Okay Ben and Jenny pay attention. I brought you to the Library of Congress. Why? Because it's the biggest library in the world. Over 20 million books. And they are all saying the same exact thing. Listen to Riley." He says making her giggle. He smiles at her before continuing with a long winded explanation about how impossible it was to steal the Declaration because of how securely it was guarded.

"You know Thomas Edison tried and failed nearly 2000 times to develop the carbonized cotton thread filament for the incandescent light bulb." Ben points out, in what seems to be a random fashion.

"Edison?" Riley asks.

"And when asked about it he said 'I didn't fail, I found out 2000 ways how not to make a light bulb', but he only needed to find one way to make it work. The preservation room. Do you know what the preservation room is for?" Ben asks

"Delicious jams and jellies?" Riley responds making Jennifer laugh again.

"No, that's where they clean, repair, and maintain all the documents and storage housings when they aren't on display or in the vault. Now when the case needs work, they take it out of the vault and directly across the hall and into the preservation room. The best time for us or Ian to steal it would be during the Gala this weekend, when the guards are distracted by the V.I.P's upstairs. But we'll make our way to the preservation room where there is much less security." Ben says.

"Well…." Riley seems to chew it over as he looks at the pamphlet for the gala. "This might be possible." Riley finishes.

"It might." Ben says.

"All right!" Jennifer cheers, quieting down once she remembered that she was in a library. They head back to Ben's and come up with a plan. Riley will hack into the video feed of the Archives, Ben will get Abigail's fingerprints using chemicals, and Jennifer will try and be a decoy, or at least keep Abigail off of their trail.

Her shopping trip with Abigail was fun. Jennifer ended up getting a beautiful fairy tale dress. It was a white halter top dress with small blue designs sprinkled across it. There was a bow across the waist and under the bow it poofed out a little and draped down to the floor. She felt like a princess wearing it but the price nearly killed her.

"It's more than $200!" Jennifer whispers frantically.

"That's cheap! Oh my gosh Jennifer, you have to buy it it's only $225, for a dress like that. It's a bargain"

"What are you wearing?" Jennifer asks, after the poor cashier had to pry the money out of her hands.

"It's this beautiful dark blue dress I bought from here last week." She said excitedly. They head back to her house and she tells Jennifer to meet her there an hour early so that they can get ready. Jennifer leaves the dress at her place and heads over to Ben's house.

"Ok, so the plan is to get Abigail's fingerprints, sneak into the preservation room, and get out... What do I do?" Jennifer asks.

"You just get to try and make sure no one notices Ben leaving." Riley answers.

"I can totally handle that." Jennifer says smiling. Before she leaves to Abigail's, Riley gives her a small microphone thing to put in her ear so that she can hear what they say and they can hear what she says. When she arrives at Abigail's house, they both get ready and she does Jennifer's makeup, because she was never very good at it. They both leave and go to the gala. When they arrive she introduces Jennifer to all her "friends."

Eventually, Jennifer hears Riley telling her that it's time to go help Ben. She walks over to the men's bathroom. Ben walks out and he smiles when he sees her.

"You look beautiful." he smiles, giving Jennifer a hug.

Jennifer hugs back and says "You look pretty snazzy yourself."

"Focus you guys." Riley says, sounding annoyed. She walks back towards Abigail and Ben follows after a couple minutes.

"Oh Mr. Brown." Abigail says confused, glaring at Jennifer.

"Dr. Chase." Ben greets her.

"What are you doing here?" she asks looking at Jennifer.

"I had no clue, I swear!" Jennifer says, shaking her head.

"Is that that hot girl? How does she look?" Riley asks making Jennifer frown.

"She's telling the truth, I made a last minute donation without telling her. A pretty big one." Ben explains, handing her a glass of champagne.

"Well on that subject thank you for your wonderful gift." Abigail says.

"Oh you did get it?" Ben asks.

"I really couldn't accept something like that normally, but I really want it"

"Well you needed it." Ben said.

"Come on Romeo, get out of there." Riley says.

"I have been wondering though, what the engraving indicated on the pipe that Big Foot took." Abigail asks curiously.

"Hi. Here you go." Dr. Herbert says, offering Abigail another glass of champagne.

"Oh Dr. Herbert, you already know Jennifer but this is Mr. Brown." Abigail introduces.

"Hi" Dr. Herbert offers a forced smile.

"Hi there"

"Who's the stiff?" Riley asks in their ears making Jennifer smile.

"Here, why don't you let me take that, so you can take that off his hands." Ben offers, grabbing the glass of champagne he gave to her earlier.

"Thank you"

"A toast yeah? To high treason. That's what these men were committing when they signed the Declaration. Had we lost the war, they would have been hanged, beheaded, drawn and quartered, and oh my personal favorite, had their entrails cut out and burned. So here's to the men who did what was considered wrong in order to do what they knew was right. What they knew was right." Ben toasts, drinking the whole glass in one gulp.

"I'll drink to that." Jennifer said with a smile, raising her glass and taking a drink.

"Well, good night." Ben finishes, walking away.

"Good night." Dr. Herbert, Abigail, and Jennifer say in unison.


	4. Santa Is Real

Chapter 4: Santa is Real

"This better work." Riley says. "How does it look?"

"It's working. It's working." Ben answers after a few seconds. He's getting the fingerprints from the champagne glass Abigail was holding.

Jennifer is standing around chatting with Abigail, trying not to show how nervous she is. They were stealing the Declaration of Independence after all! But she tried her best to remain calm.

"Okay I am going to turn off the surveillance camera. Ben Gates, you are now the invisible man." Riley says, making Jennifer smile.

"What are you smiling about?" Abigail asks her.

"Oh nothing." She says innocently.

"Sure." she says, obviously not satisfied with that answer. Luckily one of her coworkers walk over and start talking about some office party coming up for someone's birthday.

"Give me the letters to her password." Riley says.

"A, e, f, g, l, o, r, v , y." Ben says.

Riley lists off a bunch of random phrases with those letters in it that was generated by his computer but Jennifer immediately realizes what the answer is. "Valley Forge" She says, turning away from Abby so she didn't hear.

"Valley forge? I don't have that on my computer." Riley says.

"It's valley forge, she pressed the 'e' and 'l' twice." Ben explains, typing in the password.

After a few moments of silence Jennifer hears Riley screaming to Ben "I lost my feed Ben! I don't know where anyone is. Get out of there, get out of there now."

"I'm taking the whole thing with me. I'll just get it out in the elevator. Jenny, go to the van now! I'll be there soon." Ben says, .

"Sorry Abigail I have to go." Jennifer says, giving Abigail a quick hug.

"Why so early?" she asks.

"Hot date." She responds, smiling.

"Remember to use protection." she calls after Jennifer.

"What?" She asks, acting scandalized.

"Wear a seat belt. What were you thinking of?" She asks, smiling mockingly. All of a sudden Jennifer hears a gun shot and she clutches her ear.

"Who is shooting?" Riley asks, freaking out.

"Ben you still there?" Riley asks as Jennifer walks quickly out of the building and towards Riley.

"I am in the elevator. Ian's here. He was the one shooting." Ben explains.

"I hate that guy." Riley says.

"Join the club." Jennifer sighs, climbing in the front seat of the van and looking towards Riley. His face is completely red so she puts her hand to his forehead. "Are you sick?" She asks.

"No, I'm fine." he coughs.

"Good." She smiles and he turns around. She takes out the earpiece and waits for Ben to show up. Riley climbs into the drivers seat so she moves to the back, giving Ben room to jump in.

"Where are you Ben? Where are you?" Riley starts singing.

"Stop talking. Start the van." Ben says as he's walking towards the van.

"Ben, the uh, mean declaration lady is behind you." Riley says into the headset. Ben opens the back door of the van, hands Jennifer the Declaration, and then heads back to Abby.

"Stop chatting and get in the van." Riley says.

The alarms go off and Jennifer hits her head against the side of the van in frustration. "We are so screwed." Jennifer mumbles to herself.

Suddenly, Jennifer hears Abigail shouting for security and she jumps out of the van.

"Abigail, it's not what you think!" She shouts running up to her.

"We have to go." Ben says, trying to pull Jennifer towards the van with him. All of a sudden, Ian pulls up.

"Well hello." He says, Shaw pulling out a gun and pointing it towards Abby. "Hand me the Declaration." He says and Jennifer immediately realizes that Abby doesn't know it's a fake.

"Abby give it to me." Jennifer says when Abby declines. Hoping to just give it to them since it's a fake. It's never that easy. When Abby hands it over to her, they see some security guards stepping outside of the building and Ian grabs Jennifer and jumps onto his van with her.

"No!" Ben yells, pulling Riley towards their own van when Ian's van drives off.

Abigail follows them and when Ben tries to prevent her from coming with, she yells at him. "No! Those guys just stole my friend and you're going to let me come with." Ben agrees, yelling at Riley to drive, and they quickly follow Ian.

-----------

Jennifer doesn't know what to do. If she gives it to Ian then he'll look at it and know it's fake. But then again, she doesn't want to get shot, obviously.

"Just give me the Declaration, Jennifer." Ian says, smirking.

"No?" Jennifer says, turning it into almost a question in her confused state. _What do I do?_

"We'll drop you off if you just hand it over nicely. We'll even give you the pipe. You can take it back to Ben." Ian says, leaning too close to Jennifer for her comfort.

She backs up against the door and decides to just give it to him. "Here." She tosses it to him. "Now drop me off."

"Sorry honey, I lied." He says and motions to Shaw. He aims the gun at her and Jennifer grabs at the handle of the back of the door. She ends up holding on and swinging into the street. Luckily, Ben's car pulls up next to her.

"Holy lord!" Jennifer hears Riley say. Ben opens up the side door of the van and holds on to the seat belt, while leaning out of the vehicle.

"Jennifer, jump!" He shouts. Shaw shoots at Jennifer, luckily just missing and hitting the van. She jumps.

Ben catches her and pulls her into the van with Abigail's help. She sits down next to Abigail, slightly shaken.

"You alright?" Ben asks worriedly.

"I think so" she answers quietly.

"You're not hurt are you?"

"You're all lunatics." Abigail says, more scared about the whole situation than Jennifer seems to be.

"My friend was taken, shot at, and now those men have the Declaration of Independence. No, none of us are all right" she announces.

"She lost it?" Riley asks, looking back at Jennifer.

Ben explains how it was just a fake and that the real one was actually in the van, while Jennifer tries to stop her hands from shaking. It was surprisingly scary being kidnapped by a murderous British guy.

"Give me that." Abigail says, lunging for the real document in Ben's hands.

"You're still shouting and it's really starting to annoy. You'd do well Dr. Chase to be a bit more civilized in this instance." Ben says nerdily.

"If this is the real one then what did they get?" Abigail asks.

"A souvenir. I thought it might be a good idea to have a duplicate. Turned out I was right. Actually I had to pay for both the souvenir and the real one so you owe me 35 dollars plus tax."

"Genius." Riley says. Jennifer can't help but smile at this. She leans against the side of the moving van and closes her eyes, suddenly feeling tired.

"Who were those men?" Abigail asks.

"Just the guys we warned you were going to steal the declaration." Ben answers.

"And you didn't believe us." Riley finishes.

"We did the only thing we could do to keep it safe." Ben adds.

"There is no treasure map on the back of the Declaration of Independence. " Abigail says slowly, as if she was speaking to idiots.

"And there is no chance that anyone could steal this either." Ben says, shaking the container holding the Declaration. "I leveled with you 100 percent. Everything I told you was the truth"

"I want that document Mr. Brown"

"Okay my name's not Brown, it's Gates. I leveled with you 98 percent." Ben admits.

"Wait a minute, did you just say Gates? Gates? You're that family with the conspiracy theory about the founding fathers."

"It's not a conspiracy theory."

"Per se." Riley finishes making Jennifer laugh again.

Ben and Abigail turn to look at Jennifer so she says, "Don't let me interrupt your fight."

"I take it back. You aren't liars, you're insane." She says.

"Oh man, I'm hungry." Jennifer says after an awkward silence. Everyone looks at her strangely. "Fun fact." She says after tiring of the creepy stares. Ben goes on to explain that he wants to run tests on the Declaration to find the map.

"You can't seriously intend to run chemical tests on the Declaration of Independence in the back of a moving van." Abigail says. Riley informs Abigail of the clean room environment set up back at Ben's place.

"We can't go back there Riley." Ben says.

"Why in the world not, Ben? We have to." Riley asks, turning from his seat to look at him.

"I bought the Declaration with a credit card." He says.

"A credit card slip? Dude, we're on the grid. They are going to have your records from forever; they are going to have my records from forever." Riley says, starting to get worried. "What do we do?"

"We need those letters." Ben answers. "You know what, get off the road. Take a right." After Abigail asks to what letters he is referring and him ignoring her, Jennifer tells her that they are the Silence Dogood letters. Eventually, the group pull over at a park. Ben jumps out of the van and begins to pace. Jennifer continues to lean her head back against the side of the van and starts dozing off before she hears Ben and Abigail's conversation.

"You have the original Silence Dogood letters? Did you steal those too?" She asks.

"They are scans of the originals. Quiet please." Ben says.

"How did you get scans?"

"Well I know the person who has the originals. Now shush"

"Why do you need them?"

"She really can't shut her mouth can she? Now look, I will let you hold onto this if you promise to shut up please." Ben says, after handing Abigail the Declaration.

"Ben you know what you have to do." Riley says.

"I know what to do. I am just trying to think of anything else we could do. "

"Well not to be a nudge, but you do realize how many people we have after us. I mean we probably have our own satellite by now. " Riley says and gives Ben the look. "It took you all of two seconds to decide to steal the Declaration of Independence. Why are you having such difficulty with this?"

"I didn't think I would have to personally tell my dad about it." He says before Jennifer hears Abigail shuffling and Ben yelling after her. Jennifer opens her eyes to see what was going on and sees Ben chasing after Abigail. He catches her and takes the Declaration back. They start having a tug-of-war over it and eventually end up getting really close.

"Awww." Jennifer coos. Riley proceeds to give her a weird look. "They like each other." She says, like its the most obvious thing in the world. After a few seconds of him staring at her like she was crazy, it gets a little windy so she starts looking for where she left her jacket. Riley climbs in the back with her and hands her the coat. Ben and Abigail come back so they head to Mr. Patrick Gate's home-- Ben's father.

Riley parks a few blocks from his house. He doesn't want to tip off the authorities… and the satellite he thinks is following them.

They all walk up to the house. Jennifer starts lagging behind because of her heels. _Why did I have to get such high heels? _Jennifer stops for a second and pulls off her shoes.

"What's wrong?" Riley calls over, staying back with Jennifer.

"Nothing. The shoes were killing me." Jennifer said, blushing. She held the shoes in one hand and held the dress up and off the ground with the other. Riley takes the shoes from her. "Thanks." She smiled at him, glad that she had a free hand.

They reach the door quickly, right as Ben rings the doorbell. "Where's the party?" Mr. Gates asks, after seeing Abigail, Ben and Jennifer dressed nicely.

"Well uh I'm in a little trouble." Ben says.

"Is she pregnant?" Patrick asks.

"Well if she is are you going to leave the woman carrying your grandchild standing out in the cold?" Ben asks.

"I look pregnant?" Both Abigail and Jennifer ask, turning to Riley for an answer. He shakes his head, looking embarrassed. While walking in, Jennifer pulls Ben aside and asks him "Why did your father ask if she was pregnant, has this happened before?" He just shakes his head at Jennifer and walks off with her shouting after, "Is that a yes or a no?"

"Well have a seat. Make yourselves comfortable. There is some pizza. Still warm I think." Mr. Gates says, so Jennifer heads over to the pizza and grabs a piece. Riley follows.

"Dad, I need the Silence Dogood letters." Ben explains to him. "It _is_ about the treasure."

"And he dragged you three into this nonsense?"

"Literally." Abigail says.

"We volunteered." Riley says, motioning to both Jennifer and himself.

"Well un-volunteer before you waste your life." He says, giving her a weird look. "Where do I know you from?" He asks Jennifer after a second.

"It's me, Jennifer." She says, smiling and slightly surprised he recognized her. He walks over and gives her a hug.

"Your a good girl, get out of this nonsense while you still can"

"Knock it off dad." Ben says angrily.

"Sure, sure I know. I'm the family kook. I have a house, a job, health insurance. At least I had your mother for however brief of time. At least I had you. What do you have? Him?" He asks, motioning towards Riley.

"Look if you just give us the letters we're gone"

"You disappoint me Ben." Mr. Gates says, shaking his head.

"Well maybe that's the real Gates family legacy. Sons who disappoint their fathers"

"Get out. Take your troubles with you." Ben goes over and whispers something to his father while Jennifer leans over Riley and grabs another piece of pizza. She can feel Riley staring at her.

"What?" She asks, looking at Riley. He just shakes his head and then she hears the conversation at the other side of the room get louder.

"No, no, but we found another clue that led us here" Ben says, trying to convince his father.

"And that will lead you to another clue. And that's all you'll ever find is another clue. Don't you get it Ben? I finally figured it out. The legend said the treasure was buried to keep it from the British. But what really happened was the legend was invented to keep the British occupied searching for buried treasure. The treasure is a myth"

"I refuse to believe that." Ben says, making Jennifer smile.

"He's probably right. You don't even know if there is another clue." Abigail says critically making Jennifer scoff.

"Oh ye of little faith. Next you'll tell me there is no Santa Clause." Jennifer says through a mouthful of pizza.

"Well I can think of a way that we can find out. And we can find out right now." Ben says.

Ben, Riley, Abigail, and Jennifer gather around the kitchen table with Q-tips, lemons and the Declaration.

"Looks like animal skin. How old is it?" Ben's father asks, walking up behind us.

"At least 200 years." Ben responds.

"Really? You sure?" Ben's father asks, surprised at the exact answer.

"Now if this thing is in invisible ink how do we look at it?" Riley asks.

"Throw it in the oven." Patrick says.

"No!" Ben, Abigail, and Riley shout while Jennifer can't help but laugh.

"High sulfate inks can only be brought out with heat." He explains.

"Exactly." Jennifer nods causing everyone to stare at her. "Hey, sounds logical to me"

"It's very old. And we can't risk compromising the map." Ben says.

"You need a reagent." Patrick says, walking away.

"Dad it's really late. Why don't you get some rest?" Ben asks.

"I'm fine." Ben hesitantly wipes a Q-tip with some lemon juice and lowers it towards the document but Abigail stops him.

"I am so getting fired for this." Abigail says before wiping the Q-tip against the corner of the document.

"I told you. You need heat." Patrick says. Both Abigail and Ben lean over and breathe onto the document and a little symbol shows up. "See?" Ben's father says.

"We need more juice." Ben says.

"We need more heat." replies Abigail.

"Why in the world do you have all of these lemons laying around Mr. Gates?" Jennifer asks after a few minutes. He just shrugs his shoulders and then Jennifer hears Riley say.

"It's not a map. Is it?"

"More clues. What a surprise." Patrick says.

"That's why we need the Silence Dogood letters." Ben says. "The key in Silence undetected. Dad can we have the letters now?"

"Can someone please explain to me what these magic numbers are." Riley begs, after watching Ben copy down the numbers off of the back of the Declaration.

"It's an Ottendorf cipher." Abigail explains.

"Ah, the Ottendorf cipher. Good times." Jennifer says, nodding, and causing everyone to stare at her oddly.

"Riiight, what's an Ottendorf cipher?" Riley asks.

"Each of these numbers corresponds to a word in the key." Ben explains.

"So it's like that page number of the key text, the line on that page, and the letter in that line. So dad, where are the letters?"

"I don't have them." He says gravely.

"Where are they?"

"I donated them to the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia."

"Time to go." Ben says.

"I still can't believe that all this time no one knew what was on the back" Abigail mutters to herself.

"Back of what?" Patrick asks before grabbing the document and turning it over to read. "Oh my god. What have you done? This is the Declaration of Independence." Patrick says shocked.

"And it's very delicate." Abigail says, taking the document from Ben's father.

"You stole it?" Patrick asks, causing Riley to point at Ben.

"You saw the cipher. We had to." Ben says, gathering up the things.

"And that will lead to another clue. And that will lead to anther clue. And that's all you'll ever find. There is no treasure. I wasted 20 years of my life, and now you've destroyed yours. And you've pulled me into all of this." He says angrily.

"Well we can't have that." Ben says. Riley's duct tape comes in handy when they go and tie Ben's father to a chair for the FBI to find.

"I can't believe we're taking your dad's car." Jennifer says, climbing into the back with Riley.

"Your dad's got a sweet ride." Riley says, trying to lay down but she's in the way so he motions for her to join him.

"I think we should change clothes. We might look kind of conspicuous don't you think?" Ben asks.

"I would love to go shopping too but we have no money." Riley says, nuzzling his face into Jennifer's hair. She blushes.

"Here I took this from his house. He usually tucks a few hundred dollars somewhere between those pages." Ben says, handing the book over to Abigail.

"Common sense. How appropriate." Abigail states.

"When are we going to get there? I'm hungry. This car smells funny. Mmm, Your hair smells nice." Riley sighs. Jennifer rolls over for a second and props herself up on her elbow to kiss Riley on the cheek. She quickly rolls back onto her side facing the front, blushing a bright red. She sees Ben glancing through the rearview mirror and smiling at them before she drifts off to sleep with a smile on her face as well.


	5. Matching Glasses

_I have to thank **Bloody Midnight** for reviewing even though this story hadn't been updated in almost two years. I read your review and I immediately starting writing this chapter! Thanks so much to all of my reviewers, of course. I hope everyone likes this chapter! I promise I'll finish this story by the end of summer!_

Chapter 5: Matching Glasses

"Wake up Jennifer" Riley says, gently poking her shoulder.

"Five more minutes." She whines, burying her face in the car's leather seats.

"But we're here." Riley said. Jennifer looked up at him through bleary eyes and yawned.

"Good morning." She says tiredly.

"Not yet." Riley laughed. Riley helped Jennifer up and out of the car, and walked with her towards the room.

The group ended up at a hotel for the night. Unfortunately, Ben's dad didn't hide that much money in Common Sense, so they had to split a two-bed room. The original plan was to have Jennifer and Abigail share a bed, but the guys complained and Abigail offered to sleep next to Ben as long as he gave her his shirt to sleep in. Of course he agreed and that left Jennifer awkwardly sleeping with Riley.

Her poofy princess dress was not very comfortable to lay down in and Riley, being a gentleman, offered his shirt to her. She accepted and ran into the bathroom to change. Needless to say, she found it hard to come back out. Ben's shirt was very long on Abigail and went all the way down, almost to her knees. But Riley was smaller, so the shirt just draped slightly past Jennifer's hips. Luckily, she had been prepared and wore some shorts under her dress. But they were tiny. She yawned and decided getting sleep was more important than pride at this point, and walked out of the bathroom and towards the bed.

"Night Riley." She said as she climbed beside him. She suddenly realized that since she was wearing his shirt, he was sleeping in only his pants. She blushed, but buried her head in the pillow.

"Good night Jennifer." He replied quietly. The lights flickered off and she felt Riley shift on the bed behind her.

_Don't think about him behind you…. Shirtless. Oh man. _She rolled onto her back and looked up at the slightly cracking ceiling. A few minutes later she hears Riley snoring quietly next to her, and she rolled her eyes. _He can fall asleep just fine next to me. But I'm too nervous to even try. This sucks._ She pouts. All of a sudden she feels the bed sink in closer to her and Riley's arm wraps around her waist.

She rolls over, so that her back is next to his chest, and sighs. Her eyes slide shut.

"Morning you two." Abigail says, smiling at the two snuggling on the bed. Riley opens his eyes and is about to sit up when he realizes that Jennifer is snuggled into his chest."What time is it?" He whispers, trying not to wake Jennifer.

"It's already eleven, we have to go." She says and Riley starts to wake Jennifer. "Jennifer, time to wake up." Riley says sweetly in an effort to wake her up. She just snuggles into his chest, making him blush. "Jennifer?"

"Five more minutes."

"Get your lazy butt out of bed right now!" Abigail yells making Jennifer jump up.

"I'm up." Jennifer says, rubbing her eyes tiredly. "How'd you sleep?" Jennifer asked Riley innocently, remembering him hugging her the previous night. Luckily for her she didn't realize what position they were in not even a minute before.

"Fine." He smiled. "And you?"

"Pretty well."

"Anyways, we have to go get clothes so if you wouldn't mind giving Riley his shirt back." Abigail says. Riley pulls the blanket up over his chest self-consciously causing Jennifer to giggle. She runs to the bathroom to change back into her dress and comes back yawning.

"I look a mess." Jennifer says, trying to flatten her messy hair.

"You look fine. We have to go." Abigail complains.

"All right, gosh." Jennifer complains.

They pile back in the car and head out to go clothes shopping. Riley goes on his own, as he is the only one with normal people clothes on, to find out the next clue. Jennifer is stuck with the love birds. She quickly purchases a cute shirt, some bright pink converse, and some flare jeans, in an effort to avoid their flirting. She waits at the door for Riley.

He comes running up, looking very cheerful. "Where's Ben?" Riley asks Jennifer.

"Inside with Abigail." Jennifer sighs. "So what did you find out?" She asks happily.

"Come on, let's go." Riley pulls Jennifer up the stairs with him.

Riley excitedly reads the clue to the three of them.

"The vision to see the treasured past comes as the timely shadow crosses in front of the house of pass and stow."

"Pass and Stow refers, of course, to the.."

"Liberty Bell." Ben and Abigail cut him off.

"Why do you have to do that?" He pouts making Jennifer giggle.

"It's OK Riley, maybe next time." Jennifer hits him lightly on the back. He rolls his eyes at her.

Meanwhile, Ben and Abigail have figured the clue out. "So the way to see the map is found when the timely shadow crosses Independence Hall."

"What time?" Abigail asks. Ben smiles. He grabs the $100 bill he gave to the cashier and used a water bottle to see the time on the clock tower.

"2:22" He said. "What time is it?"

"It's almost three." The cashier says dully.

"We're too late." Abigail says.

"No we're not." Riley says. After receiving odd looks from everyone he continues. "We're not because… wait, you don't know this?" He asks Ben. Ben shakes his head.

"I would like to Riley."

"Ok, so day light savings didn't start until WWI, so 3 o'clock now would be 2 o'clock then."

"You're a genius Riley." Ben says Riley shrugs in false modesty. Jennifer rolls her eyes at him but smiles nonetheless.

So the group hurry over to Independence Hall and sneak in the tower.

"There" Ben says. The brick building connected to Independence Hall is covered in shade. He starts climbing back down and Jennifer follows. They both climb through a window and on the roof. The building is only a few feet away, and both rush over. Ben finds a brick with a Templar symbol on it. He pulls out a knife.

"Why do you carry around a Bowie knife?" Jennifer asks, taking a cautious step back.

"Have to be prepared." Ben said, cutting around the edge of the brick.

"How boy scout of you." Jennifer says smiling. Ben rolls his eyes but has a very different reaction when he takes out the brick.

"Look at this." Ben says smiling.

"Are these old timey 3-D glasses?" Jennifer asked excited, putting them on her face. Ben shakes his head but runs with her into the building where Riley and Abigail stand waiting.

"Nice glasses." Riley says with a smirk.

"Yeah, I match you now." Jennifer smirks. She turns to Ben and Abigail who have the Declaration flipped over and gasps. "You have to see this Ben!" She hands him the glasses.

"Wow, this is really something ." He hands them to Abigail, Riley reaching for them, but being beaten by Abigail.

"It says Heere at the Wall. With two E's." He says to a pouting Riley.

"Uh, Ben." Jennifer says hurriedly. "The evil British mafia are here." She says pushing everyone out of view of the window, and Ian's lackey.

"Okay, we have to spilt up." He divvies up everything. He gives the Declaration to Riley and keeps the glasses along with the container he carried the Declaration in. "You three go that way, and I'll lead this guy off your tail."

"Ben, that's a horrible plan." Jennifer says pointedly.

"Good luck." He smiles and runs out of the building. Jennifer rolls her eyes.

"Great, now what are we…" She turns to see Abby and Riley have disappeared. "Thanks guys." She says sarcastically to herself. She runs off to try and find them but almost immediately sees Ian turning the corner. She dashes into the nearest building which turns out to be a quaint little Italian restaurant. She hides under the nearest table.

"What are you doing?" One of the people sitting at the table says. Jennifer comes up with a quick plan.

"I'm hiding from my ex-fiancée. Please don't tell him I'm here." She whispered.

"Have any of you seen a blonde girl, about this tall running through here?" Jennifer hears Ian ask in his now creepy British accent.

"No, sorry." The man says and Jennifer bites back a sigh of relief. She hears his footsteps as he leaves and Jennifer peeks out.

"Thank you so much." She says, running out of the building.

"Ah, ah, ah. Not so fast." Ian says and Jennifer almost screams in surprise.

"I don't have anything." Jennifer says quickly, holding her hands up.

"Yeah, but we could always use another hostage." He says, roughly grabbing her wrist and pulling her with him towards his gang. _Another?_ She tried to pull her wrist free but his grip was too strong. He looked back at her questioningly.

"It was worth a try." She said shrugging pitifully.

"Oh, it won't be so bad. We may even have some fun together." Ian said creepily, his arm wrapping around her shoulder. Him dragging her around by the wrist probably didn't look normal to the people around them but she didn't like this sudden closeness.

"How about you let go now and I won't scream for help from that nice looking man over there." She smiled evilly, gesturing to a very tall, buff looking man by the ice cream parlor.

"How about you don't scream and Shaw won't shoot you." He said smirking back just as cruelly. She feels Shaw poke her in the back with the gun. She resigned to her fate.

"Let's go look over there, honey." Ian said loudly, playing up the couple act. She gritted her teeth, biting back the vulgarities she would like to shout at him. She eventually gets shoved into the back seat of a jeep and sees someone she wasn't expecting.

"Mr. Gates?" She asked in surprise. He was gagged and Jennifer reached over and took it off. "Are you all right?" She asks worriedly.

"As well as can be expected." He says.

"Sorry." She mutters, trying to reach over and untie his wrists. She barely loosens them when Ian returns.

He pulls her roughly from her seating position and pushes her, face first, against the jeep. "Why are you trying to untie my hostage."

"Sorry." She gasped, trying to shift her body so that her ribs weren't pressed so harshly against the rough metal. He pulls her wrists behind her back and ties them together tightly. He pulls some long, thin piece fabric out of his pocket and gags her with it. He shoves her in the back seat. "No talking." He says to Patrick, instead of going back in and gagging him again. Ian climbs back in the front seat and they start to drive.

Jennifer tries to loosen the knot around her wrists but its tied too tightly. After a little while she sees Patrick get his hands free from their ropes and she turns her back to him so that she can free him. He quickly unties the knot and she reaches up to untie her gag. "Thanks" she mouths to Patrick. He nods in response. They pull to a stop not long after and sit there waiting as Ian talks to some of his henchman.

It seems like hours that they just sit there, waiting. All of a sudden Jennifer hears Ben's voice and she has to stop herself from jumping out of the car.

"Ben?" Patrick asks her, reaching for the doorknob. She doesn't stop him in time and he pulls open the door. She jumps out too.

There, standing not too far away is Ben, soaking wet. Standing with Ian. Ian hasn't noticed she's left yet, and as she looks down at her blood stained wrists, she does the first thing that comes to mind. She runs.


	6. Not Alone

_Yay, another chapter! Thanks everyone for reading the story! I love reading your reviews. I finally got to insert some fluff at the end which is fun. Yay. fluffyness. =)_

Chapter 6: Not Alone

All Jennifer could hear was the pounding of her feet on the cement as she sprinted in the opposite direction of Ian. They were parked at some kind of Auto Shop, with cars being worked on. Jennifer runs through the business and turns a corner, seeing a busy street ahead. Figuring if she made it to the street, Ian wouldn't try anything in such a public place. She was wrong.

All of a sudden she feels a weight slam into her back and she falls forward. She feels the cement scrape her palms and her face as she slides on the rough ground.

"Did you think you could get away?" Ian asks angrily, grabbing the hair on the back of Jennifer's head and wrenching her off the ground. She screams but Ian covers her mouth. She feels her blood trickle down the side of her face from another scrape. She tries to push him off, since her arms are finally free, but he pulls roughly on her hair. She bites back another scream.

"Don't even try it girl." He says angrily, pushing her forward.

"Let her go." Ben says loudly. Ian shoves her to one of his accomplices who catches her roughly by the shoulders.

"We have a deal Ben. What is the next clue?" He asks. Ben looks at Jennifer and sees that her arms are being tied behind her back.

"Don't hurt her." Ben says angrily.

"It's just a precaution, Ben." Ian says, before repeating his request. Ben takes out the glasses and shows them to Ian, but that's all Jennifer can see because she is blindfolded. She bites back a curse as she's shoved back in the car.

"Mr. Gates?" She whispers, wondering if he was still there.

"Sorry, he's outside with Ben and Ian." Someone said from the front seat. Jennifer nodded. She tried to hear what they were saying outside but suddenly the radio is turned on.

"No eavesdropping sweetheart." The man said evilly, making Jennifer flinch. She leaned her head against the car and suddenly came up with a plan. She tilted her head to the side and gently rubbed her cheek against the seat. Her blindfold rolled up slightly and she could see. Jennifer all of a sudden thought smugly, _Good luck getting the blood out of the upholstery, Ian_.

All of a sudden she hears someone come sit next to her. "Jennifer?" She hears Ben ask and she smiles.

"Ben? What's happened? Why are you here?" She asks in quick succession.

"Well, I was caught by the police.." Ben says but then they hear a phone ringing in the front.

"It's your girlfriend." Ian says sarcastically.

Jennifer can unfortunately only hear his side of the conversation. But she quickly realizes that Abigail has made some kind of deal with Ian. Hopefully it involved her and Mr. Gates being freed, and soon.

"She's right here with me Riley. You want to say hello?" Ben asks, sounding like he is smiling.

She feels the phone pressed up against her ear. "Jenny?" She hears Riley ask, and she can't help but smile.

"Your safe?" Jennifer asks, trying to not sound worried. He snorts.

"Am I safe? You're in a car with Ian and his henchman, don't worry about me." He says sounding happy but his tone quickly changes. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine. A little bit annoyed at the blindfold and the bondage…." She said as a hint to her captors, but nothing happened so she sighed. "I'm doing all right. Where is…."

She's cut off by Ian who grabs the phone and shuts it off. "What, wasting your minutes?" Jennifer asks sarcastically.

"No, you're rambling was annoying me." He said smugly, making Jennifer roll her eyes. No one could see it, because of the awful, rather uncomfortable blindfold, but still.

Ben finishes his explanation of what was going on. He was taking Ian to the next clue and then they would all be free. Jennifer wasn't so sure about that last bit. She had heard that before, and Ian didn't seem to have gained a conscience or a sense of morality since his lie in the van. She took a deep breath, hoping it would in fact be true this time.

The car pulled to a stop and Jennifer heard the door open on her side. Someone grabbed her arm and pulled her out of the car. She tripped on the curb and almost fell but who ever had her arm, held her up.

"Idiot." The man mumbles. She couldn't tell who it was, it wasn't Ian, it was another of his lackeys. She thinks it may be Shaw.

Ben tells Ian it must be in Trinity Church in an effort to get them to untie her. Ian relents and unties the blindfold, much to Jennifer's relief. She is pulled into the church along with Ben's father and both are forced to sit in the pews.

"I thought we would be free." Ben said angrily.

"I lied. Now, where is the treasure, Ben?" He asks.

"This is all I know." Ben says. Jennifer knows he's lying but she hopes that Ian doesn't.

"Come now Ben. I know you aren't telling the truth. I don't think you entirely realize what's at stake here." Jennifer hears the creaking of the wooden doors open and she hears Ben groan in frustration.

"What?" Jennifer asks aloud, trying to turn around to see them. "Riley?" She gasps, seeing him and Abigail pulled in the door.

"Jennifer, what happened?" Riley asks, trying to get out of the grips of his captor. Needless to say, he fails. Him and Abigail are shoved onto another pew, on the opposite side of the church.

"Enough! Ben, where is the treasure?" Ian shouts. Ben explains that he need to see the map and Ian opens up the Declaration. He looks at it, lifting the different colored lenses in order to read it.

"It's really something." He says, handing the glasses to Ian. Jennifer rolls her eyes. Even though Ian is a crazy madman, Ben still shares with him.

"Beneath Parkington Lane?" Ian asks. "Why would it lead us here and then take us somewhere else?"

"It must be somewhere beneath the church." Ben explains. Ian and Shaw head towards the door that will lead them downstairs. Riley runs up to Jennifer and pulls her into a hug.

"What happened?" He asked, his voice lower than usual.

"Does it look that bad?" Jennifer wonders. There is only a dull pulsing ache on the side of her face and on her palms but Riley looks freaked.

"Your bleeding." He said softly, reaching his hand up to her face. "Does it hurt?" He asks before Powell came and shoved them both forward.

"Get a move on you two." Jennifer sees Ben and Abigail chatting at the top of the stairs, above what appears to be a boiler room. They walk around them, but Powell shoves them forward too. Jennifer and Riley reach the bottom of the stairs quickly and both start looking around the room.

"I found it!" Riley exclaims after a moment. "Parkington Lane." He reads. Ben rushes over.

"He was a third degree master mason." Ben says, hand tracing the gravestone before he sees Shaw coming at him from his peripheral vision. "Hey!" He shouts, dodging he sledgehammer that cracks the grave. Ian's goons pull out the coffin and place it on the ground.

"Okay, who wants to go down the creepy tunnel inside the tomb first?" Riley asks. Jennifer feels her chest constrict at the thought. She's never been one for small, dark places.

"Mcgregor, Viktor. You stay here. And if anyone comes out without me. Well, use your imagination." Ian said smirking. "Well, ladies first." He motions to Jennifer who shrinks back automatically.

"Maybe I could go last." She says quietly, feeling foolish for the obvious shake in her voice.

"Don't worry, I'll be right behind you." He says in a tone that gives her no comfort whatsoever. He unties the rope that bind her wrists and pushes her forward.

"I'll go first, Ian." Riley says quickly but Ian just shoves Jennifer more forcefully.

"She'll be fine." Ian hands her a flashlight.

Jennifer takes a deep breath and climbs into the tomb. Her heart beats wildly in her chest as she tries to focus on the opening up ahead. Her hands sting with renewed fervor as dirt enters the relatively fresh wounds in her palms.

"Hurry up." Ian grunts from behind her and she tries to crawl faster.

The tunnel wasn't as long as she originally imagined and she pulls herself out shakily, using the flashlight to help everyone else get out. Ian lights a torch and they continue on their journey.

They reach a stop and Ben points out a huge wooden chandelier. He lights it, and pushes it out to the center of the room, lighting up the room.

There are wooden stairs and a dumbwaiter system of elevators up and down what appears to be a very deep crater.

Ben grasps Jennifer's hand in his and gives it a reassuring squeeze when he remembers that she isn't very fond of heights either.

"Jennifer?" Riley asks, tapping her on the shoulder. She jumps.

"You scared me." She clasped a hand to her chest.

"Sorry." He said quietly. "What happened?" He asked again. She reached up and wiped at her face.

"At least it stopped bleeding.." Jennifer said trying to smile. He gave her a look and she sighed. "I fell."

"Jennifer, just tell me."

"Ian kind of pushed me. No biggie. I'm fine."

"I hate that guy." He groans making Jennifer smile. She pulls him into a hug. "I'm glad you're all right." He said, a blush spreading across his cheeks.

"Thanks Riley."

"For what?" He asks, a slightly dazed smile on his face.

She shrugs, a smile lighting up her face. "I'm just glad you're here."


	7. Calculus in a Nutshell

_Yay, chapter 7! Although this is close to the end of the movie, only one scene left, I'm going to write some chapters about their life afterwards, as famous treasure hunters! Thanks to all of my readers and my reviewers: xxroxy-dogxx and rgauthier. Special thanks to xxroxy-dogxx because when I read your review I realized how much I wanted to see Jennifer punch Ian too. On that note, I hope everyone enjoys this chapter! =) _

Chapter 7: Calculus in a Nutshell

Ian forces Patrick to walk out onto the wooden staircase first. The antique bridge squeaked and groaned after each step. The group followed quickly, and they made their way slowly down the tunnel.

All of a sudden the wood collapses under Shaw's feet. He tries to grasp at the end of the splintered step but misses, and his screams echo through the room as he tumbles into darkness.

The whole section of the staircase started crumbling under the pressure. The bit of wood Riley stood on starts swaying, and he ends up jumping over to a safer landing. Jennifer rushes forward, trying to reach a safer stair, but the wood collapses beneath her.

She quickly jumps, trying to reach the nearest landing. It was too far.

She lands roughly on her stomach, her legs hanging over the edge.

Her fingers grasp desperately at the wooden landing, trying to find something stable in order to pull herself up. She can't find anything. The smooth wooden step is impossible to grip and she can feel herself sliding downward. She hears someone calling her name and almost cries in relief as Riley grips her arms and pulls her up.

"Are you all right?" Jennifer hears Riley ask. She clutches her arms around his waist tightly. Her whole body shakes, an after effect of the adrenaline rush from the near death experience. She barely hears his repeated questions, his hands rubbing her back softly trying to get her calm.

"You're all right Jennifer." He whispers and Jennifer takes a final deep breath.

"Sorry." She says quietly, removing her arms from their death grip on him. "Not a fan of heights… or death." She tries to joke. Riley pulls her forward as Ian starts yelling and telling them to get a move on. Riley grips her hand tightly in his and she feels safer.

Luckily, the elevator doesn't seem damaged. Ian reaches forward and pulls Jennifer by the wrist onto the lift.

Sick of being manhandled by Ian, Jennifer pulls her free arm back and crashes it into the side of his face.

"Holy…" Riley gasps, seeing the red-faced Ian clutching his cheek.

"How dare you touch me." Ian growls, back-handing Jennifer across the face. She stumbles backwards from the force, her hand clasped to her stinging cheek. Tears fill her eyes.

Riley races forward and punches Ian with such ferocity, Jennifer almost feels bad for Ian. _Almost. _"Never touch her again, you asshole!" He throws another punch, but Ben pulls him back.

"Who do you think you're dealing with here?" Ian asks, pulling a gun and pointing it at Riley.

"Don't do this Ian, is it really worth another life?" Ben asks.

"Do you think any of you matter more to me than Shaw did?" Ian asks angrily. He takes a deep breath and motions to lower the elevator. "We are going to find the treasure." When they get to the bottom they reach an empty room. Needless to say, Ian is not too happy.

"Someone beat us here!" Ben exclaims angrily, making the group flinch. "We're too late."

Ian starts yelling at Ben about something, but Jennifer is too preoccupied to listen. _We can't be too late. This can't be it. Poor Ben._

Ian and his crew run over to the elevator and are about to leave the rest there. Jennifer suddenly thinks of something. _When these guys were building this hiding place, wouldn't they have made another exit? They've been smart about this whole thing so far, it would be pretty bad architecturally if it only had one exit._

She hears Ben telling Ian about the next clue and she suddenly figures out what's going on.

"One if by Land, two if by sea. Thomas Newton hung one lantern in the steeple at the Old North Church to signify the coming of the British. The next clue is in Boston at the Old North Church." Patrick Gates explains after his son.

"Thank you." Ian says cordially, before starting to lift the elevator.

"Hey, you can't leave us here!" Jennifer shouts, deciding to throw that in there for a little believability.

"If we need help, we'll know where to find you." He says smugly, before they leave.

"What's going on?" Riley asks, noticing the smile on Jennifer's face and Ben, who is searching for something.

"The British came by sea, so it would have been two lanterns." Abigail points out.

Jennifer feels the need to add "Besides that, it was Robert Newman who lit them." Ben sent a smile over her way.

"So you did learn something in college." Ben says smugly before returning to his search.

He finds some type of indent in the wall and he pulls out the pipe.

"The secret lies with Charlotte." He mutters, before pushing the stem and the pipe in as make-shift keys.

The wall opens up and Ben pushes his way inside. He uses his torch to light a string of fire that encompasses the entire room, and Jennifer gasps. There are rows upon rows of beautiful statues and sculptures that fill the room. She sees Abigail standing near a shelf full of scrolls, and Riley walks over to a statue.

"It's a big blueish-green man with a strange-looking goatee. I'm guessing that's significant." He leans into the statue for a hug and Jennifer laughs. She looks at all of the art, and missing history, with a wide-eyed fascination.

"It's all so beautiful." Jennifer gasps, reaching her hand out to lightly trace a vase standing near Riley's favorite statue. She doesn't notice Riley looking at her as he agrees.

They join Abigail, Ben, and Patrick.

"Are you crying, Riley?" Jennifer hears Abigail ask. She looks up and notices that he is teary-eyed.

"Look, stairs." He says and Jennifer laughs, grabbing his hand in hers.

"We're saved." She says cheerfully. Luckily these stairs are sturdier than the last, although they still creak under their feet.

Ben breaks through first and ends up calling for Agent Sadusky, someone he must've met when he was caught by the police. When asked about bargaining, Ben says to him "How about a bribe? Say, 10 billion dollars?" He's obviously joking, as Ben quickly hands him the Declaration, and explains to him where the treasure is.

"You're not very good at bargaining are you?" He asks Ben, who chuckles and shakes his head.

"Here's what I want. Abigail has to get off scot-free, not even a post-it note on her record. And the credit for the find should go to the entire Gates family, along with the assistance of Ms. Jennifer Cassidy and Mr. Riley Poole."

"Okay." Sadusky nods. "What about you?" Ben sighs.

"I would love not to go to prison. I can't even begin to describe how much I would love not to got to prison."

"Someone has to go to prison, Ben."

"If you have a helicopter, I think I could help with that." Ben smiles.

"Are you talking about Ian?" Jennifer asks, a smile growing on her face at the prospect of Ian being sent to prison. Ben just smiles.

They fly to Boston, and watch as the police arrest Ian and his crew. They wave him farewell.

-----------

"This has been crazy." Jennifer sighs, sitting beside Riley in the helicopter as they wait to head back home.

"We're so rich right now. Millionaires. I'm a millionaire… I'm a millionaire!" Riley says excitedly, in such an adorable fashion that Jennifer can't help but smile.

"Congratulations, Mr. Treasure-Hunter. What are you going to spend it on?" Jennifer asks, trying not to laugh.

"A sports car. I mean, come on. If I get a sports car it has to help with the ladies." He says, smiling and looking all dazed.

_I didn't even think of that. Shoot. I have no chance now. I mean, look at him. He's really good-looking, and, like he says, he's rich now. And famous. He could get any girl he wanted, why would he choose me?_

"Jennifer?" Riley asks for the third time, waving his hand in front of the girl's face.

"Yeah?" She asks.

"You left me there for a minute." He chuckles and she blushes.

"Just thinking. So, what did you want to ask?"

"Just wondering, if you were any good at math." He asks. Jennifer nods. "Okay, so if the treasure is worth 10 billion, and we spilt the one percent four ways, then how much would we each get?"

"Well, 1 percent of 10 billion is 100 million. Dividing that by four, you get 25 million. So we would each get about 25 million… wait a second, we each get 25 million dollars?" The sheer gravity of that fact hits Jennifer all at once. "25 million dollars?"

"25 million dollars." Riley nods, smiling.

"That 10 billion dollar amount was a rough estimate, it could only be 1 billion for all I know." Ben admits, his head popping up between Jennifer and Riley's seats.

"_Only_ 1 billion? Ben, we would still end up with 2.5 million dollars each… 2.5 million dollars!" Jennifer says, in awe of such a large amount of money.

"Your such a math nerd Jennifer." Abigail says, smiling at her friend from the seat beside her.

"It's only zeroes, Abby dearest. Zeroes and basic division. Not my fault you couldn't even handle second semester calculus."

"Hey! I took more math than my major required. I'm proficient in the subject." She says, using her, I'm-_so_-better-than-you tone.

"Everyone can be proficient, but you have to have guts to be great." Jennifer says before laughing. Abigail starts laughing too.

"I think it's nap time." Jennifer yawns, resting her head on Abigail's shoulder.

"You get kid-napped by the bad guys, almost fall to your death in the tunnel, punch Ian, find a 10 billion dollar treasure, become a millionaire, send the bad guys to prison, and end the night by taking a nap?" He asks, raising an eyebrow at her.

"Even amazing treasure hunters like myself need rest, Riley." Jennifer says with a smile. "Nice nut-shelling though."


	8. A Couple Of Idiots

_Thanks everyone for revewing! I love you guys! When I got your reviews I started writing immediately. Thanks so much to all of my readers as well. To answer your question, I'm going to finish off this story with some chapters in between the movies. And if people still like it, I'll write a sequel about the second movie. Riley is an awesome character to write about, and just an awesome guy in general so I can't see me ever getting tired of writing about him *sigh*. I do love me some Riley fluff, (lol, my English teacher would be proud) but this chapter couldn't be too fluffy because then the story would be almost over! Also, I had to give more details on the character flaws for my poor OC… her unending naivete and lack of self-confidence. Oh, and her clumsiness, of course. So, I hope everyone likes this chapter, and I'll try and update quicker next time!_

Chapter 8: A Couple of Idiots

The days following the discovery of the Templar treasure were insane for Jennifer. She was sent to the hospital after the capture of Ian, agent Sadusky felt bad that he hadn't noticed her wounds before but quickly rectified the situation by getting her to the hospital in no time by landing the helicopter on top of it.

The wounds weren't serious at all. She needed two stitches on her forehead, but the scratches on her wrists and palms were shallow. She was assured she would have no scars; although she thought it would have been pretty awesome if she did, she knew it would be weird to say so aloud.

After that they were carted off to a hotel, each with their own room this time. The next morning was when it all began. They had their first press conference.

It was loud. Flashes were going off and everyone was asking questions, mostly to Ben. But Riley, Abigail and Jennifer each answered a few questions. Riley seemed all too happy to be in the spotlight, smiling for the cameras and joking with Ben. Jennifer on the other hand was completely flustered. She had never enjoyed being the center of attention, and although they were focused mostly on Ben, she had trouble keeping her voice from shaking.

"David Laney from the New York Times. Ms. Cassidy, how did you end up involved in this treasure hunt?"

"Oh, well I have been friends with Ben for a long time and when I found out he was looking again I followed." Jennifer answered shakily. The man gave a swift nod, a few notepad pages flipped as she answered. Riley and Abigail were asked similar questions. While Ben was asked the more important questions, things pertaining to specifics on what they had found and estimations on what it was worth.

Jennifer was just glad when it was over. She was forced into a crowd of people as they headed out. She eventually snuck out, and looked back to see Abigail on Ben's arm with Riley laughing at something someone said. Jennifer just shook her head and walked towards the Starbucks she saw on her way there. There was no way she was going back in there. She headed to the bathroom first.

One glance in the mirror and she frowned. She didn't look like herself at all. She woke up that morning with a knock on the door to three women sent to help her get ready for the conference. They had brought along an outfit for her, where they found out her size she had no clue, but it consisted of something she never would have bought for herself. A pencil skirt and a short sleeved white blouse. They left one too many buttons open for Jennifer's comfort, but they said it looked cute so she resigned to letting them decide. They also covered her face in layers of make-up. Concealer, blush, eyeliner, eye shadow, mascara, and lip stick made her look like a total stranger. She splashed water on her face, and used paper towels to wipe it off.

After some serious scrubbing, she got it all off. Her skin was red, leaving her to wonder if she had scraped off a layer of skin in the process. Her hair was done in loose curls, some pulled up in a clip in the back. She pulled it down, leaving it to hang over her shoulders. She longed for the comfort of a t-shirt and jeans, but figured that a strong cup of coffee would have to be enough.

After ordering, she sat staring out the window for a while, taking sips every once in while. She felt a tap on her shoulder and almost spilled her drink. She turned quickly and found Riley looking at her angrily, his arms crossed.

"What's wrong?" She asked, standing up quickly.

"We've been looking all over for you. Why didn't you tell anyone you were leaving?"

"You guys were busy and I didn't want to stay, so I left. I'm a grown woman, Riley I can make my own decisions." She was surprisingly angry. She admitted to herself that it was partly out of envy. How Riley, along with Ben and Abigail, were so charming and funny in front of all of those people and how she barely stuttered her way through. But if she was really honest with herself, she would admit that she was more angry that Riley didn't even notice how embarrassed she was, or try and help her when she felt like she was suffocating in the crowd of people. He hadn't noticed when she left for knows how long and she realized her feelings must be one-sided.

"So sue me for worrying about you." He snapped.

"Where's Ben and Abigail?" Jennifer asked, not sure what to make of his sarcastic comment.

"They're back at the conference center looking for you." Jennifer nodded and turned to leave. "Wait." She raised a confused eyebrow. "Are you all right?" He asked quietly.

Jennifer looked back at him with a look of complete bewilderment.

"You seemed a little nervous before, and I figured, if you snuck off, there must be something wrong. Is anything wrong?" He asked again and Jennifer shook her head slowly.

"I'm a horrible public speaker." She said quietly before smiling. "But everything is fine. You're pretty good at it, though."

"What?" Riley asked, looking genuinely surprised.

"Well, you were rather charming Riley. It seemed like you went to press conferences every morning." Jennifer smiled.

Riley chuckled. "I was probably just as nervous as you." He said, a red tinge showing up on his cheeks. Abigail and Ben walk in just in time to prevent another awkward moment.

"Jenny, why did you leave?" Abigail asked angrily, pulling Jennifer into a hug.

"I was thirsty." Jennifer smiled, raising her cup of coffee. Abigail shook her head and huffed angrily. She pulled at Jennifer's arm.

"Come on, time to go home."

Jennifer turned back to Riley quickly. "Thanks for coming to look for me." She said, immediately turning red and turning back to Abigail.

Jennifer smacked herself on the forehead on the way out, feeling like an idiot. _Thanks for coming to look for me. Ugh. Could I be any more obvious?_

"So, you and Riley, huh?" Abigail asked with a smile.

"Yeah right." Jennifer said with a sigh.

"Come on, he is already head over heels." She said, acting like it was obvious.

"We are talking about Riley Poole right?" Jennifer asked, looking at Abigail. She gave her a look and Jennifer laughed. "Yeah right. I practically throw myself at the guy every time I see him. He can't like me."

"Boys are all idiots Jennifer. He just doesn't know you like him."

"What else could I do? I kissed the guy…" She was cutoff by an incredulous look from Abigail. "It was on the cheek. In the car, remember?" Jennifer shook her head "Anyways, kisses, hugs, compliments. I know I'm not very good at flirting, but come on! What else can I do? Put up a sign that says 'I love Riley Poole'?" Jennifer says in frustration. Abigail laughs.

"That's an idea." She smiles when Jennifer shoves her lightly. "Kidding, kidding. But seriously, its obvious he likes you. He practically attacked Ian for you. And Riley doesn't seem the type to fight. He's a bit scrawny if you haven't noticed."

"Hey!" Jennifer giggles, shoving Abigail teasingly. "No insulting the man who protected my honor." Jennifer says jokingly. "There is a perfectly reasonable explanation for his punching Ian." Jennifer says nodding. "Everyone wants to hit Ian. I mean, come on. Wouldn't you have liked to get in a good punch?" Abigail just shakes her head but Jennifer smiles knowingly.

"See, Ian is a jerk. Seeing him hitting a girl just made Riley's manliness kick into action. He's probably old-fashioned, and doesn't like seeing a woman get hurt." Jennifer nodded, believing that explanation over the belief that Riley could actually like her.

"You're perfect for each other." Abigail said under her breath.

"Huh?" Jennifer said, turning her head at the statement and promptly walking straight into a tree. "Ow!" Jennifer shouted, clutching her head in pain.

"A couple of idiots."


	9. Indisposed in ScoobyDoo Boxers

_Hey reader buddies! I really have to hurry up if I want to finish before I'm off to school! I think one or two more chapters until the end. I honestly have no clue where this chapter came from.... I was totally going to have Riley and Jennifer start dating in this chapter but, I guess this works too...._

_So, one of my friends read this and got a little confused with the I Never part... just in case anyone else doesn't how to play, basically a person says "I never.... wrote a fanfiction." And anyone who HAS written a fanfiction has to drink. I'm sure ya'll know how to play, but just in case. ^_^_

_And thanks to all of my awesome readers and reviewers! mutantXspawn, xxroxy-dogxx, 4everyoursX, Sucker4aGoodStory, and HookedOnAvatar011. So many reviews for a single chapter and I still took so long to update, I'm sorry!! ='( I'll work harder this time! I hope everyone enjoys this chapter... and doesn't hate me at the end._

Chapter 9: Indisposed in Scooby-Doo Boxers

It had been a while since Jennifer had seen Riley, or even Ben and Abigail. Riley had quit his job and started writing a book the last she heard from him. It was about government conspiracies and other legends. Jennifer was definitely going to buy a copy.

Each person had reacted differently after the discovery of the treasure. Jennifer had decided, albeit grudgingly, not to quit her job. With her portion of the money she could easily have lived without her measly wages, but she didn't have much else to do.

She also decided to wait a bit before traveling. If you asked her why she would have a good, logical reason, but it wasn't what was really holding her back. For some reason she really didn't want to leave the country. And it had quite a bit to do with a certain nerdy up-and-coming author.

She had been tossing around the idea of going back to school, but for what she wasn't sure. She had paid off all of her old college debt and bought a few necessary things: a large television, a fancy laptop, and a manga collection she found on eBay. But with her remaining five million dollars in the bank, she was itching to do something.

The only correspondence she has kept with any of her fellow treasure hunters has been a weekly e-mail correspondence with Abigail, who had also remained at her career. With little real news to share on either side, Abigail's messages consisted mostly of how her and Ben were doing, and blatantly obvious hints telling Jennifer to talk to Riley.

Jennifer wanted to call him. When he gave her his phone number almost a month ago she had every intention of calling him within the first week. But she had nothing to tell him. Nothing new had happened, and without an excuse to call, she kept pushing it back. But now she was prepared. She had the phone in her hand, and the phone number scribbled on a piece of paper on the table in front of her.

"Is nine too late?" Jennifer shook her head, no backing out now! "Ok, be cool Jennifer. The worst that can happen is that he's busy, and he'll say no." Jennifer turned the phone on and waited a moment for the dial tone. She took a deep breath and dialed.

"Hello?" A distinctly female voice answered the phone. _Of course his girlfriend is over. Should I even ask him anymore? _

"Um, is Riley there?" Jennifer decides to ask anyway, just in case it was a sister he never mentioned or something.

"Who is this?"

"Jenny. I'm a friend of Riley's." She quickly added the friend part, just to be safe.

"Well, he's…. indisposed at the moment." The woman said, sounding as if she was smirking.

"Oh, well could you tell him I called?" Jennifer said quickly, just wanting the conversation to be over.

"Absolutely Jamie."

"It's Jenn-" _She hung up. Great_. Jennifer hangs up her phone and slaps her forehead.

"Why did I even call?" She asks aloud, groaning dejectedly. _Of course he has a girlfriend, what was I thinking? _Jennifer glares angrily at the phone. "He's indisposed." She mocks, frowning. "What does that even mean? Stupid… I saw him first…" She grumbles. Eventually she realizes that sitting around pouting isn't doing her any good. With no plans for the night, she changes into a baggy t-shirt and some shorts. She grabs a carton of chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream from the freezer along with a spoon, and plops down in front of her new T.V. to watch a movie.

The phone starts ringing half way through, and Jennifer practically flies off of the couch to get it.

"Hello?" She answers quickly.

"Jenny? It's Abigail." Jennifer sighs, before sitting down.

"Oh, hey Abby. What's up?"

"I just got your e-mail. You said you were going to invite Riley to the movie because you got some free tickets. So, did you?"

"I called him an hour ago but some girl answered. She said he was busy."

"Oh, Jennifer. Maybe it was a relative?"

"She insinuated something more." Jennifer said after a short pause. Abigail said something to console her but Jennifer changed the subject over to Abigail and Ben.

After a short conversation, Jennifer headed back to the T.V. to find melted ice cream. She sighed and went to the kitchen for a cup. "A shake works too."

-------------------------

(Riley's Night)

"Well this stinks." Riley plopped down on his sofa after a long couple of hours spent typing up the latest chapter of his book. His hands were surprisingly cramped. He was not new to using a computer, but the continuous typing was genuinely bothering his fingers. He was still two chapters from finishing, and although he had plenty of ideas for both, he was having trouble with the research.

Google searching both Area 51 and the Kennedy Assassination gave him plenty of information, but what should he include? How many of the alien sightings should be mentioned? Riley sighed, running a hand through his hair. It would be so much easier if he could just type out everything he believed without needing the back-up of other sources, but his editor was not letting him off easy.

The doorbell rang, freeing him from his thoughts. He walked over and pulled open the door. "Marie?"

"Riley!" The woman squealed excitedly, jumping and pulling him into a hug. Riley awkwardly patted her back.

"Wow Marie, I haven't seen you since university. How have you been?" He asks politely, as she struts into his house.

"I've been great! I heard about the whole treasure thing and I had to come congratulate you." She said cheerfully. Riley had to work to keep his eyes trained on her face. Marie had dressed much too skimpy for a friendly visit. She was wearing a shirt so tight it looked like a second skin, one that was very low cut. She wore a mini skirt and four inch heels as well. Riley could feel his face getting red. Her blonde hair was curled and bounced around her shoulders as she stepped past him.

He suddenly remembered another blonde, one who hadn't contacted him in almost a month. He had spent the past three weeks debating on whether or not to call the number Ben gave him. He had given Jennifer his number but after the first week he was convinced she had either no intention of calling him, or she lost it. He hoped it was the latter.

"Riley?" _Oh right, Marie is here. _

"Sorry, what was it you came for again?"

"I wanted to congratulate you, silly! It's not every day an old friend finds treasure. I brought champagne!" She giggles, pulling a bottle from her purse.

"That really wasn't necessary." Riley said nervously, shaking his head.

"Of course it is! It'll be fun. We can play I never! I love that game." She cheered, heading over to his kitchen and grabbing two glasses. She slipped out of her heels and sat cross-legged on his couch, showing way too much of her legs to be appropriate to mere friends.

"Come on!" She smiled waving him over. Riley glanced up at the ceiling, saying a quick prayer to help him survive through this, and walked over to join her.

"I've never kissed a girl." Marie said, smirking slyly while lifting her glass to her lips. _Oh brother_. Riley took a swig of his drink as well. "It's your turn Riley." She giggled and Riley knew that this was not going to end well.

He was right. Riley knew he couldn't handle alcohol, but he got tipsy much faster than he expected. He felt light headed after only his second glass, although to be fair the glasses were pretty big. And he hadn't eaten anything since lunch.

"You know, I always thought you were cute." Marie giggled, leaning much too close to him, and resting a hand on his thigh.

"Really?" Riley asked, jaw dropping open. Marie giggled and he shook his head.

"What, do you have a girlfriend?" She asked, pushing him back onto the couch.

"No but.." She cut him off by kissing him. "No! I don't think… I mean…. I haven't talked to you… and Jennifer…." He stumbled, his mind groggily coming up with reasons he shouldn't be making out with the hot blonde throwing herself at him. He stood up and backed towards his hallway. "Maybe you should leave."

"Such a gentleman, like always. But Riley, I don't want to leave." She said seductively, and he shook his head again.

"I really don't…." He said, his head feeling light. "Not a good idea." He said before suddenly falling backwards.

"He passed out?" Marie asked aloud. "Seriously?" She shook her head but leaned over and started carrying/dragging him to his room. She plopped him down on his bed and helped him undress, leaving him in his Scooby-Doo boxers. She couldn't help but laugh as she tucked him in. Then she slipped into his t-shirt. She was about to climb in next to him when she heard the phone ring.


	10. Riley Can Do the Robot

_Yay, I updated on time for this chapter! Hehe. Unfortunately there is only going to be one more chapter for this story *sigh*. It had to end eventually... Anyways, thanks all of my reader and reviewer buddies! You guys are the awesomest! I got four reviews for the last chapter! I was so happy! HookedOnAvatar011, xxroxy-dogxx, 4everyoursX, and I-Am-Beloved, you guys rock! I sent a few of you responses but my evil computer for some reason won't allow me to respond to the rest. So thanks so much for your reviews! Admittedly, they are a big reason I wrote this so quickly. Alas, I am unable to actually motivate myself, it's all you guys! _

Chapter 10: Riley Can Do the Robot

Jennifer woke up in an odd position. She was still sitting up, her legs curled under her, and the remote still in her hand. She groaned, and stretched her sore muscles.

"I should have put the big television in my room." Jennifer sighed. Her thoughts flipped back to the previous night and she remembered the movie. _Who should I take now?_

There was this one nice guy at work who she wouldn't mind spending time with, but she had no clue how to ask him. Would it be a date? Did she want it to be a date? What about Riley?

She shook her head tiredly. _Riley has a girlfriend, so why am I still thinking about him like this? _She got ready for work, her thoughts focused safely on what she had to do that day. She decided to just ask James if he wanted to go with her. Maybe if she went out with someone else she could stop obsessing over _him_. Or at least that's what she hoped.

-----------(Riley's Morning)-----------

"My head." Riley groaned, his hand reaching out to the nightstand automatically to get his glasses. For some reason he couldn't find them. His eyes sprang open, and he groaned again. The light coming in from the window caused his head to twinge painfully. He found his glasses on the floor, luckily they weren't broken. One glance around the room and he knew something was wrong. Clothes that were definitely not his littered the floor. He stood to find his pants right at the side of the bed. He pulled them on quickly, trying to remember what happened the night before.

_Ok, so I was writing my book… and then Marie came over. We drank and I remember kissing her but… oh no. We didn't. Did we? I would remember something like that…. Right?_

Marie walked into his room in his t-shirt. His eyes widened and he suddenly felt nauseous. He sat back down "Mornin' babe." She said, leaning over and kissing him softly on the cheek. "I brought all the essentials for getting over a hangover." She smiled at him and he just gawked.

"What's wrong?" Marie asked, tilting her head to the side in confusion.

"Why are you wearing my shirt?" Riley asked the first thing that popped into his mind.

"I wanted something comfortable to wear, don't you think it looks nice?" She asks flirtatiously. Riley blushes violently.

"It's not that." He stutters out. She hands him two Tylenol and a glass of water. He swallows them quickly, glad for the chance to think up something to say. Unfortunately, it didn't take up nearly enough time. And he still had no idea what he should say at this point.

_Just come out and say it Riley. _He goaded himself. "Did we…." Riley points at her and then at himself, trying to explain himself without having to say the words. He fails, and scratches his head in embarrassment.

"If you mean slept together, than yes. Don't you remember?" She pouted before sighing. "I thought I was pretty good."

Riley shook his head quickly and a new round of nausea swept over him. "How can I not remember?" He asked aloud.

"Maybe I can help you with that." Marie said seductively. She was suddenly in front of him, pulling him into a kiss and climbing on his lap.

"Wait." He pulls back, taking a few deep breaths to clear his mind. "We shouldn't be doing this."

"What?" Marie pulls back, her eyes suddenly filling with tears. "What was last night then? A mistake?"

"I…. I didn't mean…."

"Was I just a one night stand?" She looked angry and Riley suddenly felt horrible. He couldn't just ditch her after they slept together. _If we slept together. _Riley still didn't want to believe that _it_ actually happened. He liked Jennifer, and he clearly remembered turning down Marie's first advances. _What happened last night?_

"Well?" She asked angrily, her hands on her hips. Riley realized he hadn't answered her yet.

"No, I meant that I usually like to date girls first." _Usually? Right, like I ever had this problem before. _"So what about breakfast?" He turned to look at the alarm clock on his bed and realized that it was already noon. "Make that lunch?"

She smiled and nodded, wiping the tears from her eyes. He sighed and didn't notice the smirk that marred her pretty features as she left his room.

-----------(Back with Jennifer)-----------

Her day had not been going well. She had spent the morning doing various menial tasks for her slave-driving boss. She hadn't been asked to get coffee since her first week at the job but her boss suddenly decided to treat her like an intern again. Apparently the month off had made her boss less than happy. And he no longer seemed to consider treasure-hunting a good enough excuse.

Her afternoon was spent trying to get up the courage to ask James to go to the movies with her. "I can't do this!" She eventually shouted out, louder than she meant to.

"Is there something wrong, Jennifer?" James asked sweetly. Jennifer blushed. _Here's your time, go for it!_

"Nope, I'm good." She forced a weak smile.

"You sure? You don't look so well." He reached out a hand to feel her forehead.

"I'm good, actually I wanted to ask you something. Are you busy Friday night?"

"This Friday?" After a nod from Jennifer, he shook his head. "Nope I think I'm free. What's going down?" He asked, an adorable smile gracing his face.

Jennifer giggled. "Well I got some free tickets to see an early showing of Spy Mail, and I was wondering if you'd like to accompany me."

"Are you kidding? Of course I'd love to go." He smiled back perfectly and even though she did like James, she couldn't help but think of _him. _Riley'ssmile was more quirky and adorable. It always made her feel all tingly and warm. She started smiling at the thought of it.

She shook her head and started planning with James.

The week went surprisingly fast for Jennifer. A few big assignments took her mind off of her boy troubles most of the time. And she even spoke to Ben. He had called under the guise of asking for advice and ended up quizzing her on her relationship with their nerdy colleague. It seemed Abigail convinced Ben to help in her goal to get Jennifer and Riley together.

Now that she knew the two were in cahoots, she decided to avoid talking about Riley with either friend. The decision proved difficult with the almost hourly e-mails Abigail sent, all trying to get Jennifer to call Riley 'one more time'. Jennifer didn't want to bother him though. If he had a girlfriend, who was she to interrupt? No matter how much she wanted to.

-----------(One Last Switch)------------

Riley throws himself onto his bed, utterly exhausted. It had been a long night.

He had spent the day typing up his last chapter when all of a sudden Marie called. She wanted him to go out on a date. He agreed and ended up going out to a club with her. He was honestly surprised he even got in. He supposed that with a girl that looked like Marie on his arm, they would let him in anywhere.

Unfortunately, she expected him to dance. And while he was pretty good at the robot, if he did say so himself, he wasn't quite up to speed at the whole club scene. He mostly just stood there awkwardly while Marie danced, if you could call it that. It was like fully clothed sex really. Riley made sure to stay away from liquor all together this time. She didn't.

He had climbed into a taxi with her to make sure she got home safely, when she spilled everything. She told him that they had slept together, but that was it. Just sleeping. She explained everything that happened that night. He walked her to her door and took the cab back to his place.

"Wow, I can't believe she did that to you man. She was psycho." The cab driver said to Riley after a few moments of silence. _Of course, a complete stranger heard the whole thing._ Riley was embarrassed. Even though he wasn't in love with Marie, he had to admit that it felt nice to be liked. Especially by someone as good looking as her. "But at least now you can be with the one you really like." The man looked back at him through the rearview mirror with a smile.

"How did you…"

"It's written all over your face." Riley smiled. _Why am I feeling sad? This is terrific news_! Now he was free to call Jennifer. Ben had explained how Jennifer had called him and how Marie must have answered it. Now he knew that Marie had just lied to Jennifer. And Riley needed to call her to clear the air. And to ask her out.

Riley wakes up the next morning, ready to call Jennifer. Before he remembers that she still works at her old job. One call to Ben and he knows her hours. She gets off of work at three on Friday's.

"OK, you can do this Riley." He says to pump himself up. It's 3:30 so she should be home. He gets off of the couch and grabs the phone.

"Hello?" Jennifer asks, clearly out of breath.

"Jennifer? It's Riley."

"Oh! Hey Riley." She didn't sound as happy to hear him as he hoped.

"You called a few days ago but I missed it and I was wondering if…" He was cut off by the sound of a doorbell through the phone. _She just got off of work, who was visiting now?_

"Sorry Riley, one second." She says hurriedly, before putting down the phone. He hears a clearly male voice in the background, although he can't be sure what the guy is saying. He hears her laughing, and he gets a bad feeling.

"Yeah, Riley? I called to ask you to this early showing of a movie I won tickets for but I didn't get you so I made other plans."

_So good news, she called me first. Bad news, she had someone else to call second. Well, this sucks. _

"So, I kinda have to go now." She says after a pause.

"Oh, yeah. Well, I'll talk to you later." Riley says dejectedly.

"Bye Riley."


	11. Into the Sunset

_I'm off to college tomorrow so I made it just in the nick of time! Woohoo! Thanks so much for reading and reviewing all of you. I haven't decided whether or not I'm doing a sequel... if I have free time at school I probably will, but unfortunately thats a pretty big if... Anyways, you guys are the bestest! Seven reviews for the last chapter... seven! I feel so loved *wipes away tear* hehe.. Anyways, thanks so much to my reviewers: I-Am-Beloved, xxroxy-dogxx, 4everyoursX, rgauthier, Music Moon Queen, Bloody Midnight, and PaNiCiNgReBeLaNgElS.  
I hope you enjoy this chapter and thanks again for sticking with me!_

Chapter 11: Into the Sunset

Riley plopped down on his sofa and put his head in his hands. _Right when I thought it was all going to work out. _He groaned. _Why couldn't I have just answered the phone and went with her? _He lifted his head slowly, his hand reaching up to push his glasses up the bridge of his nose. He had a plan.

Riley grabbed the phone.

-----------

Jennifer sat in a normally quiet and peaceful delicatessen, no longer trying to quiet her animated laughter. James was enthusiastically explaining his experiences in Japan, most of which were far funnier than she had expected.

After calming down, Jennifer curiously asked "Can you still speak Japanese?"

"Not as well as before. I'm actually a lot better drunk." Jennifer choked on her Mountain Dew.

"What?" She giggled.

"It's true. I speak really good Japanese while intoxicated." He nodded seriously, taking a drink of his soda. "That's how you get good grades in Japan, by the way. Go drinking with your professors."

"Thanks for the advice." She smiled. This 'date' was not what she expected at all. They had went for a walk through the park before stopping for sandwiches. And James was a perfect gentleman the entire time. Holding open doors, pulling out chairs. He even brought her flowers. Jennifer was pleasantly surprised. Which was why she couldn't understand why her thoughts kept turning back to Riley.

He still had a girlfriend as far as she knew. So why did she keep comparing the two? And even more troublesome, why did Riley keep coming out as the victor?

She was drawn from her thoughts by another highly amusing anecdote from James. By the end she was once again disrupting the peace with her laughter.

The couple went from there to the theatre on foot. Jennifer was glad she had worn her comfortable flats. She had tried to dress up and ended up wearing a knee length black skirt and a tight, slightly low cut, dark purple top. She hadn't been on a date in a while and she even put on a little make-up, mascara and lip gloss.

James had dressed nicely as well. He was wearing black dress pants and a crisp white shirt with a sports jacket thrown over. He looked hot. It was actually kind of intimidating, but he joked around enough for her to feel relatively at ease.

As they got in line for the movie, she felt him put his arm around her.

-----------

Riley raced down the street in his bright red Ferrari. He had just tore apart his apartment, looking for a phone number. After finally finding it, and promising the man on the other end to help him with some computer troubles, he had accomplished his goal. After driving to the man's house, he was now going to the movies.

Now, it would seem odd to a normal person for anyone to be racing twenty miles per hour over the legal limit just to go see a movie, and usually Riley would agree. But today, it was imperative he got there early.

He pulled up quickly into the nearest parking spot and leapt out of the vehicle. It took him 38 seconds to get to the entrance. Unfortunately, there was a line. He stood on his tippy toes, trying to look around the crowd to find his target. He couldn't see her.

He didn't see Jennifer until he reached the front of the line and gave the teller his ticket. Unfortunately, what he saw made him doubt his choice to come. She stood in the refreshment line with another man's arm around her shoulders.

"Number 1 on your left, enjoy the movie!" The chipper girl said, handing Riley back a ticket stub. He almost turned to leave, but he saw Jennifer casually shrug the man's arm off. _Maybe this wasn't a lost cause. _

He headed over to them, taking a deep breath. He wouldn't talk himself out of it.

-----------

"So, I spent more time at the break room than at the job!" James was telling another story. And although it was interesting, it was starting to get a bit exasperating. While she was genuinely fascinated by all of the places he'd been, she was starting to get a little annoyed at how he talked at her, instead of to her. It was like he was spouting out a monologue. It had it's funny moments but it just wasn't as enjoyable as a conversation. And when he put his arm around her for a second time, she cautiously shrugged it off.

"I have to go visit the little girl's room. I'll be right back." She said quickly, thanking her lucky stars to get away for a moment.

She almost made it to the door when someone grabbed her by the arm. She turned quickly and gasped in shock. The last person she expected to see stood in front of her.

"Jennifer." Riley said, letting go of her arm quickly.

"Riley? What are you doing here?"

"I came to see you." He said quickly, his eyes quickly dropping to his feet.

"You came to see me?" Jennifer couldn't help the smile that pulled at her lips.

"Yeah, see a bunch of things happened but I'm not going out with anyone. Really. It was a huge misunderstanding. See, one of my old friends from college came over and…"

Jennifer cut him off by pulling him into a hug. He was rambling out of nervousness, something she found hopelessly adorable, so she decided to help him out.

"Thanks for coming to explain things."

"But I haven't really explained anything…" He stuttered as she pulled back, his hand nervously pushing his glasses up.

"I trust you." She shrugged, smiling. "Besides, the movie starts in like ten minutes, and I actually did want to see this one.."

"Oh, yeah. You would probably want to get back to your date. Sorry, I wasn't thinking about that part of…"

"No! I'm going to cancel with James, I'm assuming you have a ticket too right?" Riley nodded, looking dazed.

"Good, I'll be right back." Jennifer walked over to James only to see him flirting with the girl selling the popcorn. And she looked like she was still in high school. _Ew._

"James, I found an old friend that I really want to catch up with. You can take the ticket, I'm gonna go sit with him, all right?" He looked only slightly put off, and Jennifer rolled her eyes.

"Riley?" Jennifer asked, when she walked up to him. He was looking at her determinedly.

He nodded to himself, pushing his glasses up his nose. And then he did it.

Riley kissed Jennifer. His lips were soft and warm against hers. His hand cupped her cheek softly, holding her carefully.

Jennifer's eyes fluttered closed moments before he pulled back, but it took her an extra second to open them. If she was expecting anything, it wasn't that.

Riley cleared his throat awkwardly, blushing bright red. He started to open his mouth to say something but Jennifer cut him off.

She threw her arms around his neck and pulled him into another kiss. A bit harder and more passionate than the last. It seemed that the roles were reversed. Jennifer was no longer the one stunned and Riley seemed more than a little shocked.

"It took you long enough." Jennifer said with a brilliant smile on her face, her arms unwinding themselves from around his neck. Riley smiled even wider and wrapped an arm around Jennifer's shoulders.

"And now we're off into the sunset." Riley said dramatically, motioning towards the door to the movie.

"What is this supposed to be, a romance story?" Jennifer giggled at him.

"What else would it be? I play the mysterious, and dashingly handsome male lead and you are my beautiful damsel in distress." Jennifer couldn't help but giggle. He was too adorable.

Jennifer reluctantly shrugged off his arm in order to turn around and face him. She crossed her arms. "I'm sorry, but you are definitely mistaken. For I would be the strong, independent woman, and you would be my nerdy love interest." Jennifer challenged, smirking at him playfully.

Riley blushed pink and Jennifer cursed her slip of the 'L' word. "Me, nerdy? You wound me." He says, clutching his chest goofily. Jennifer laughs.

"I suppose, you could be my mysterious, dashingly handsome, nerdy love interest." Jennifer giggled.

"Sounds good to me." Riley smiled at her and grasped her hand in his. His fingers entwined with hers. She couldn't help but smile back.


End file.
